Poem: May 31, 2019

Parenthood

I've learned to still my inner
voice when the children are away.
After twenty-two years, it's
an act of self-preservation
as much as it is editing.

So easy to be obsessive-
Gollum with his Precious,
Gatsby's love of Daisy-
so easy to ask the dark
questions when the house
is too silent, when the kids
are more absent than I like.

Of course you're not screaming
into your gag in the trunk
of some maniac's car. Of course
you aren't trying to outrun
a tornado or drinking bleach
on a dare, or even just crying
silently in your bed, wishing
somehow, impossibly, I would
hear you, sense your need.

To think that way is madness.
No sane person would
tell themselves such stories.

You learn not to tell yourself'
such stories even if
they itch you like a scab.

Poem: May 30, 2019

Food for Thought

My thoughts linger over tomatoes
right off the vine and split open
and dripping into the cucumber salad,

and they find themselves drifting
easily into the steamy, spicy cloud
that gathers above the pan when I am
frying bell peppers and onions,

and let's be honest, a honeycrisp
apple slice run through creamy
peanut butter will turn the eyes
of anyone's thoughts, or pair
that same apple with smoked
almonds or earthy gorgonzola

and oh mama, our thoughts should
not be held responsible for themselves.

My thoughts these days are more
likely to frequent the richer spaces
where a threesome of steak and
dark chocolate and pinot noir
can be had, but they aren't above
slumming it with a Twinkie
or a frozen pizza now and then.

Poem: May 29, 2019

Warden

We've built a lovely prison
for our cats, full of soft
and pillowed surfaces and
squares of sunlight splashed
across the floors. Whole
baskets full of catnipped
diversions litter every
corner, and still they loiter
near the door, looking for
small chances to break into
the wilds of our backyard,
and we do our best to play
the prison guard, to hold
the line and separate the
safe from the uncivilized.
No point in meowing, you
are staying inside with your
box for pooping and your
processed foods- a warm
harbor, my pets, where you
have the names we gave
you, and where you won't
be needing those claws.

Poem: May 28, 2019

Least Resistance

Leslie says the universe is with her,
and to be honest, I often feel the same.
The way opportunity appears when
it is needed most, Yahtzee on the final
roll. Some unexpected Deus Ex Machina
picks the lock on the front door, plops
down next to you on the couch, and
what are you going to say except, yes,
of course. Everything I touch turns
to gold, except when it doesn't, but
I just keep rolling, trusting some cosmic
set of bumpers will keep me in my lane.

Poem: May 27, 2019

Vanity

One shouldn't ask others
to list the things for which
one will be remembered.
But how else is one to know?

We spend our days
accomplishing what we
accomplish, being who
we think we ought to be,
but who can predict what
others will remember?

A bad haircut, or the time
you passed out on the stairs,
or your habit of collecting
boxes of sand from each
beach you visit. Or some
association you've forgotten-
a song, the smell of apples,
a deck of cards, the moon.

We will live on in ways
we did not choose. Not
the tellers, but the told.

And who would not want
to see themselves as they
are drawn with someone
else's pen, to see the dust
that we've tracked in?

Poem: May 26, 2019

Slepsky Dinners

I used to be the biggest presence in the room,

all frenetic energy and constant movement, a

voice to command attention, the surest ideas, 

the wittiest stories with a literary flair, and 

charm enough to fill the space at hand, and...

and... and then I met you, and your family, 

and was, in a word, diffused or de-fused, my

noise lost, my explosive potential removed.

I was decelerated in the confusion of a huge

family made of huge personalities and huge

volumes booming and bouncing off each 

other in joyous, unplanned movement. Living

at an athletic pace, a robust pattern of loving

interruption, passing a baton in no particular

order, holding court in a crowd of royalty.

It's like stepping into traffic that's all gas and

no brakes. It's like being promoted to the next

level and having to learn a new tempo or be

trampled at the bottom of the scrum, where

stories, my stories, cannot slowly unfold

because that is not the goal. I've learned you

pass the ball, or if you hold on, you run hard.

It's not about a sense of order. It's not about

decorum, or social norms, or reaching some

goal or decision, or achieving a consensus. No,

it's about giving yourself over to a loving chaos,

adding your voice to a feral chorus and joining

in the twisting, cacophonous, Slepsky fun.

Poem/Quote: May 25, 2019

Marcus Aurelius Quote

from Meditations

The speed with which all of them vanish-

the objects in the world, and the memory

of them in time. And the real nature

of the things our senses experience,

especially those that entice us with pleasure

or frighten us with pain or are loudly

trumpeted by pride. To understand

those things- how stupid, contemptible,

grimy, decaying and dead they are-

that's what our intellectual powers are for.

And to understand what those people

really amount to, whose opinions

and voices constitute fame.

And what dying is- and if you look at it

in the abstract and break down

your imaginary ideas of it

by logical analysis, 

you realize

that it's nothing

but a process

of nature,

which only children can be afraid of.

Poem: May 24, 2019

Slow Day

Nothing I thought was very big today.
Just how the heat wears through us so
quickly; also, that someone needs to
pick up their shoes and put them where
they belong, even shoes have places
to belong; and to de-claw a cat may be
cruel, but tell that to the furniture, tell
that to the version of me who will one
day hate the ripped upholstery and have
to buy new furniture, and paint, and
probably re-carpet, and the day will
likely be hot that day; and everyone,
really, has lovely eyes that sparkle. All
eyes sparkle- those of daughters, and
cats, and carpet installers. I have eyes
that sparkle; and that everyone can read
a poet's mind; and given time in a quiet
room, thinking becomes tethered dreaming.

Poem: May 23, 2019

Playing Outside

Summer, and the sun
is just an evening edge,
low on the horizon, and
the sky behind us, an
impossible purple. A gold
glow from the light kits
splashes across the band
at odd angles, reflects
off the chrome on the mic
stands and drums. Even
the guitar strings and
tambourines shimmer
as the air around us
cracks and pops, an
electric hum and echo.
And isn't every song
some sweet piece of
candy, the way it feels
in the mouth? Something
to be moved around or
hummed toward- mmm-
like a kiss, and we close
our eyes, and we close
our eyes, and we breathe
deep and sink into this
sweet drink. This long,
cool flow, you know, this
swaying in the breeze.

Poem: May 22, 2019

Daily Intentions

That our pits not stink and
our nails be free from dirt.

(Lord, hear our prayer.)

That we never find ourselves
one puzzle piece short.

(Lord, hear our prayer.)

That our hands are free when
suddenly our noses itch.

(Lord, hear our prayer.)

That those of us who like to
dance have that opportunity.

(Lord, hear our prayer.)

That we remember our dreams
and that they be colorful.

(Lord, hear our prayer.)

That we go many months
without touching a sticky surface.

(Lord, hear our prayer.)

That someone else cancels
that useless meeting.

(Lord, hear our prayer.)

That we learn new words and
have the chance to use them.

(Lord, hear our prayer.)

That the traffic lights we
encounter behave sensibly.

(Lord, hear our prayer.)

That all of our produce lasts
an impressively long time.

(Lord, hear our prayer.)

That we find something fun
the next time we check our pockets.

(Lord, hear our prayer.)

That all mosquitoes find us
thick-skinned and unappealing.

(Lord, hear our prayer.)

That we play games without
anyone losing their shit.

(Lord, hear our prayer.)

That we never spill the milk
or leave the caps off the markers.

(Lord, hear our prayer.)

That the ice cream in the freezer
be abundant and free from burn.

(Lord, hear our prayer.)

Poem: May 21, 2019

New Car

Getting a car loan is like getting engaged.
When you've had enough bouncing around
every three years among the youngest models,
with their clean lines, free from scratches and
dents, when you are ready to stop leasing and
make a commitment, and you know that means
for better or for worse, like when the bozo in
the Aldi parking lot dings your door, you're
going to have to choose whether you got
hitched to the paint job or the potential of
high mileage and reliability and safety features,
and all of the carpet stains and fender scratches
that come with the miles of highway scenery,
and weekend getaways, and room enough
for all the gear, and summer nights at the
drive-in, and lunches on the go, and homework
on the way to school. Each year settling in
further and coming to terms with all those
crayons and popcorn and McDonalds fries,
watching the latest styles passing by, shining
in their bright colors, their perfect skins, and
knowing that this is until death do you part,
until the day the transmission gives out on
the first leg of family vacation, and you
have to call the salvage yard to carry her away.

Poem: May 20, 2019

Abnormal Behavior

If you knew I was writing you poems

you might come to expect it, you might

eventually say You used to write me poems,

but you don't do that anymore. And I 

would have to find the time, prioritize

writing over the long list of other things,

like going to the gym or remodeling

the basement, which is what I do already:

I write you poems first. You just don't

know it. I've been tempted several times

to tell you. I think I have even said

What if I wrote you a poem? and you 

looked at me like you were thinking

As if... and I thought to myself If you 

only knew, and I felt a little smug. Imagine

the lovely moment we might have when

I handed you a stack of poems, so many

meditations on you, on us, on love and

its odd complications and quiet corners.

Would you swoon? I'd love it if you 

swooned, but you don't seem much for

swooning. And that lovely moment

could only be lovely once, and I'd expect

so much, which could only feel like

some obligation from which we would

both have to move on, and then I'd

worry about what would happen to

the poems (where would you keep them?)

and about sustainability, and would any

poem come to me as naturally as these?

And isn't it better to write you poems

in secret and let them dance in the shadows

of our life like imps, like Eros, like

the scent of flowers on the wind? I know

you'd have an answer if you knew. 

Poem: May 19, 2019

8909 Petersburg Road

I've watched my parents build
their marriage around their house
(the house, I am told, my father
dreamt of as a child). The same
house now for nearly fifty years,
evolving, adding on, renovating
as one does, as life demands, but
always this one address, on less
than an acre, the old parsonage,
the farmhouse on the hill, one
of the first in McCutchanville,
a landmark, I suppose. And for all
those years, some version of Dad
up on his ladder, scraping away
flaking paint, replacing the rotten,
shoring up the compromised, filling
the holes that find their way over
time, and Mom in the garden,
wrestling the weeds, decapitating
moles, defending her kingdom;
splitting what is overgrown,
preparing the beds for new color
and new life. Now, I don't know
if they ever talked about this, if
they ever planned to give this gift
to one another. Perhaps it happens
that people do, but mostly, I think
that people drift, and it feels like
my parents landed and never lifted,
never gave themselves over to
the shifting winds. Instead they
worked their way into the marrow
of this house. They did not settle in,
but centered themselves around
the fire. Theirs is a house that knows
its way, a living place, a place that
breathes and returns itself to
its own, ongoing reverential tasks:
Such constant tending and attention.
Such beautiful, steady sacrifice.

Poem: May 18, 2019

It's Not the Heat

The first day it happens,

it slaps you and sticks

to you like wet Saran Wrap,

a sliding, sagging 

second skin, an oppression

made of sunlight and 

the rotting remains of 

thunderstorms.

Get used to it. It happens

a lot around here.

Poem: May 17, 2019

Song Without A Rhyme

I can't remember the last time I tried
to do a handstand in the grass
or rolled like a cylinder down a hill
or rode my bike all over town.
I don't remember, I don't remember.

When was the last time we stayed up late
and watched the sun rise before bed,
or spent the afternoon at the park
playing games and chasing about.
I don't remember, I don't remember.

Wasn't there a time that was easier, easier
to let our impulse take the lead?
With nothing scheduled and nothing to prove,
we could be fools, we could be fools
drifting in our own wide open spaces.

Did I really ever sleep on the ground
or dig some deep hole just to dig?
Looked under rocks, held bugs in my hands
or drank the water from the hose.
I don't remember, I don't remember.

Wasn't there a time that was easier, easier
to let our impulse take the lead?
With nothing scheduled and nothing to prove,
we could be fools, we could be fools
drifting in our own wide open spaces.

Let's get the soccer ball out of the shed.
Let's build a fort in the living room.
Let's catch fireflies, keep them in jars.
Ambush someone with water balloons.
And try to remember, try to remember
drifting in our own wide open spaces.

Poem: May 16, 2019

Order

I suppose you could call them prayers,

these wishes we put out into the world,

these intentions that flicker to life, 

sometimes suddenly, sometimes upon

reflection, the extension of some inner

monologue or passing conversation.

I hope those guys are doing well, or

Please let that car stop in time.

Released from our Sunday school narrative,

we still assume some benevolent presence

on the other end of the line, some divine

and kindly consciousness to whom we plead

our daily cases, somebody with some pull, 

some powerful friend on the inside. If not

that, then at least the fantasy that there is

some limit to the terrible odds we face.

Poem: May 15, 2019

Brief History

We don't know a damn thing.

Say we can describe someone
who is eighty as old. Then a span
of eighty years, from birth to death
is one old person, a useful unit
of measurement if one wants
to consider one's place in history.

One old person ago, for example,
my grandfathers would have
discovered that the world is capable
of more than one Great War
as Hitler signed his Pact of Steel.
And perhaps they read the account
that Lou Gehrig was the luckiest man
on the face of the Earth at their kitchen
table, windows open in the heat of July.

Two old people, head to toe, or
grave to cradle, and John Brown's men
are raiding Harper's Ferry to instigate
a slave rebellion- just two old people!
And Big Ben had just begun counting
time above the Houses of Parliament.

It only takes the lives of three people
(and for me a short trip up the road)
to find Americans at war, fighting for
their independence at the Battle
of Vincennes, or in four months to see
the court martial of Benedict Arnold.

Add one more and make it four
old people and the pirate William Kidd
is captured and tried in Boston.
Five, and the first African slaves
were delivered to Jamestown, Virginia.
Six, and Henry the Eighth takes
his fourth wife (and his second Anne).

Jump to ten old people, a mere ten
human lives stretched like a shadow
behind us, and Genghis Khan and Francis
of Assisi were wreaking their separate
brands of havoc on the world.

And it takes just twenty-five completed
lives to reach the Roman Empire
and Jesus Christ....

And one only needs sixty-three
octogenarians, people similar to others
we've known, who have been born,
played games, worried over time and
food, kissed their children, taken
and given life, stooped and breathed
their last breaths in wonder or fear.
Just sixty-three people, running their
short arcs, their allotted legs
in our human relay. Sixty-three.
Hardly enough to fill a room.

Poem: May 14, 2019

There From Here

If I could paint a picture of a life
that I might choose for us, I imagine
I would start in some impossibly
sunny seaside town in which all
of the houses have names and history,
but never leak, never sag beneath
their own weight- all clapboard
siding painted in bright colors,
but worn to show their age with
window boxes and garden gates,
and every neighbor interesting
and artful and well-read, and every
shop and tavern local, and every
citizen actively in love with our town
in which all of our families live
simple and extended lives and play
chess and card games and create
sculptures that linger in our shared
spaces, all tasteful, all curious.
Some European place with narrow
lanes and flower carts and ruins
on a hill. Some place with ghosts
and stones. A place to go slow
and work our essential work with
both our minds and with our hands,
where we would return home early
to uncork wine and eat cheese
and apples with our friends. And you
and I would walk green mossy paths
in the evenings and read to each other
from leather-bound books. Whitman.
Atwood. And in the gray-blue distance
the sound of trains, and nearer us,
the clear and playful passing of a brook.

Poem: May 13, 2019

Block

It's the thing you hit your head against.
Gray and rough and solid.

Or the thing you run around- left,
then left, then left. Same scenery. No stops.

Or the sound you make in disappointed
judgement. What started out promising, ended...

Poem: May 12, 2019

Mother's Day

I have my Mom's hair

and her restless hands, 

her webbed toes, and

her taste for wine, and 

I age slow just like my

Mom. I go, go, go. And

I've got her achy hips

and her love of lists 

and her need to be the

life of every party. I

like to make things

because she makes 

things, and we both 

like to make big plans.

If I have a flair, a kind

of panache, she did that.

If I tell stories, she told

them first. We are just

two motors running, 

two minds planning 

two moves ahead, two

hands ready to put 

things into the world.

Poem: May 11, 2019

Pennies

Grandpa saved pennies in Mason jars
in the bottom cabinet of the sideboard,
a habit born of the depression.

When we spent the night, we kids would
take the pennies out like treasure, dump them
clattering on the table, and sort them

by date, by mint, identifying Ds and Ss
among the stacks we formed like towers,
separating the wheat and steel pennies

that came from the war. We didn't think
about the distances they'd traveled,
the pockets, the people they'd touched.

We didn't think about what these pennies
had been exchanged for, what they'd purchased,
the shaving brushes or shoe horns, the coffee

cans filled with nails, the handkerchiefs.
We thought about how rich Grandpa must be,
the weight of pennies dripping through our hands.

Poem: May 10, 2019

Marginalia

Remember when libraries used to be dark?

Deep and winding corridors, caverns really,

with towering walls of shelves and narrow

aisles. Stacks upon stacks, so heavy they say,

that the Indiana University library is still

sinking under their weight. Libraries used

to produce their own atmosphere, a sweet,

earthy smell in the shadows, something

made of leather and pulp and human remains.

Old libraries cast long shadows, were long

shadows themselves. I remember libraries

that felt like the dark forests described 

in children's stories, places to hide inside of,

places with faraway echos and odd noises

hidden behind the next turn, places to decode,

places where much is buried. Imagine those

books, some passing decades between hands. 

Imagine the strange words written in the margins.

Poem: May 9, 2019

Bottom of the Box

I think it is safe to say that
the optimism of the 20th century,
the wonder and giddy anticipation
with which Disney and Sagan
framed the future on the television
consoles in my grandparents'
living rooms, may be in decline.

We've seen thriving markets crash,
and great wars descend into ongoing,
simmering conflict. We've built
a powerful marketplace of lies
and normalized villainy, while
rolling our eyes at any mention
of values. What values? Yours?

The shining cities of the Jetsons
and Tomorrowland, the floating lives
of leisure, the United Nations and
space exploration, have been
replaced with the tribal self-interest
of brand loyalties and slick marketing,
the stark ingenuity of consumerism.

The future is less to be welcomed
than feared, mitigated if we can.
Whole island nations soon to be
ankle deep with worried eyes scanning
the horizon. Our lives increasingly
sold to the cold purposes of machines,
committed in service to a system.

Perhaps it's best that we abandon
the folly of control, watch the chaos
unfold, and let what is be laid low.
After all, the Kennedys and Kings
carried the taste of dust bowls and
Jim Crowe, of trenches and fox holes.
What if they weren't so sure as they had hope?

Poem: May 8, 2019

This Is How Hitler Happened

The goldfish you brought home 

to our apartment from a night out 

at the fair with your mother's parents

swam like mad in its thin plastic bag, 

filled with unnaturally blue water, 

the color of mouthwash or Windex.

There ought to have been some rules 

written into the divorce decree to cover 

situations like this, but there you were, 

smiling and sticky and fascinated at six 

and three, so we dumped our new pet 

into the only workable receptacle I had-

a Lenox crystal bowl that had somehow 

made it into my pile during the dividing. 

Seriously, I didn't expect the creature 

to last. It came from a festival game.

In blue water. We set it in the kitchen

next to the stove with the broken burner. 

We didn't give it a name, and to my 

knowledge,  we never fed it. We certainly 

never went out of our way to purchase 

real fish food that we could shake 

like seasoning into its leaded home. 

When the water evaporated about half-

way down the bowl, I'd run it under the tap, 

unleashing a cloud of filth that would 

eventually settle- a cruel existence 

that lasted a stunning nine months.

I know I could have ended the waiting,

poured the whole mess into the toilet 

or through the disposal during one 

of the long stretches you spent at 

your mother's house, but I was afraid 

to face it, to face you, to explain, and 

I think I needed something to hate.  

At night, alone in the kitchen, I would 

stare into the bowl and ask, "Why 

don't you die?" It's weird that I used 

to think that story was funny.

Poem: May 7, 2019

Bionic

My watch cheerfully tells me the time of day
and reminds me of my upcoming appointments.

My watch suggests I turn left on Lincoln when
I am headed in to work, so I turn left on Lincoln.

My watch tells me it is time to stand up
and I stand until it can tell that have stood.

My watch tells me to take a minute to breathe,
and I breathe deep breaths in time with its tapping.

My watch says I am behind on my steps,
and I step and pace and watch the numbers tick.

My watch interrupts, demands attention like a toddler
pointing out every text and email and tweet.

My watch is concerned that there are storms on the way,
and I feel them rumbling and wait for instructions.

Poem: May 6, 2019

Hermes

The hummingbird flitted into the frame
of the front storm door window
like an actor entering from stage left
and crossing to center stage, then hovered
and exited so quickly that I wondered
if I had seen it at all. After all,
it is rare to see a hummingbird here
in our urban neighborhood, but then
the irises with their purple tongues
are blooming as are the dogwoods
and the columbines. And Leslie
just hung a sign on the front door
that says "Welcome Spring." It's nice
to imagine the hummingbird dispatched
in response, some fleet, winged messenger
who makes his appearance at the beginning
of Act I and sets the mayhem in motion.

Poem: May 5, 2019

Waste Not

My parents still own a VCR

and a handful of tapes one has to rewind.

A small window of found time, a machine

you can hear working.

Mom says, "Why would we get rid of it?

It still works, and the kids like the shows."

It's Winnie the Pooh. The youngest is ten.

But I get it. We like to be prepared

and we tend to fill our spaces.

Dig through the closets and the boxes

stacked high in the garage, and you

are likely to find a lot that has been

left behind- a wooden tennis racket, 45s.

You might find a buckeye that was picked up

off the ground thirty years ago, or the colander

they got as a gift for their wedding.

There are even items that began life

with my grandparents. Survivors. Memories

piled behind closed doors- too good to be let go.

Poem: May 4, 2019

The Fall of Rome

America can feel like a terrible place,
all of us as selfish as babies, entitled
and blind to our wealth, expecting
too much from our paychecks and
feeling like just because we have
neither the time nor the resources to
fix the attic stairs or to replace the
damaged doorframe where the burglars
broke in, that we are trapped and
everything is broken and Walmart is
too crowded and filled with plastic
crap that we, in turn, use to fill our
houses, and wouldn't it be nice to grow
our own tomatoes and peppers, but
of course, we won't because time
is full and it passes like a dirty river,
and some asshat keyed my car just
before the lease was up, and nothing
is easy, nothing is ever easy except
complaining and giving up and letting
wine and the media fill our cups with
diversions, and isn't that all of us,
rolling our eyes back into our heads
at the latest mess the political class
has scraped up from the bottom of
the pot-- all of us fed from a boiling
pot-- a big, steaming sense of injustice
and dissatisfaction and dust that
collects like ashes and is never swept
up, and we're fighting over virtues and
clutching on to power, constantly
positioning ourselves against the other
and we never hear the barbarians
or imagine the reasons that they gather
at our gates, sharpening their axes,
and all I really want to say is let them
come in. I don't like feeling helpless
or envious or given to waste. I want
to grow a garden with tomatoes and
I want to become wise in my old age.

Poem: May 3, 2019

Retrospective

We've been through this before,
the closed door, the suggestion
of oncoming curves, the sudden
shifts from little girl to uncontrolled
force and hardened will, the kind
of shores that otherwise careful
sailors find themselves dashed upon.

And we know what this means,
that we are becoming less interesting
while her own reflection is drawn
into focus like an artist's study,
something to be perfected, edited
and considered critically from new
angles and through unfamiliar filters.

She is modeling herself like clay,
bending and twisting, reshaping,
or painting a self-portrait, battling
a difficult canvas with never any
of the right colors or brushes, painting
over, erasing, raging for hours
upon hours, alone in her studio.

And we will wait for the invitation
to gather like patrons to a gallery
where we will admire her best
and finished work, cited (we hope)
as influences and source material.
We'll look for evidence of ourselves
in the brush strokes and title cards.

We're not there yet, and we've been
through this before, this letting go,
and in these next days we might
be forgiven if we give in to our urge
to unbend what she has bent, to mix her
colors and to hold her hand, the one
we both know is holding the brush.

Poem: May 2, 2019

My Notebooks

My notebooks say a lot about my brain:
Everything, everything shoved in tight
wherever I can find a place and in no
particular order- not chronological or
in order of importance, just a hoarder's
fortress, a snake pit of tangled words
and the occasional doodle or drawn
partition in an attempt to create order
amid the bits of inspiration, images,
and grocery lists, notes from meetings
written mostly to have something to do
with my hands, outlines and bullet
points left behind and adrift eventually
boxed and stacked against one another
as if crowded into an attic, Exhibit A
in the evidence of my state of distraction.

Poem: May 1, 2019

Not Forward and Not Back

I used to romanticize the past.
There's not a lot to regret or
not like, growing up white,
male, straight, and middle-class
in the suburbs, with bikes to ride
and friends with trampolines
and sledding hills and a long
string of girls to crush on.
Nostalgia comes easy- all curves
and security and personal firsts.

For my earlier years, life was
the act of looking backward,
of celebrating and replaying
the highlights, rewinding and
aching on a five-year delay
while the present grew more
complicated and contentious
in its unsupervised state.
So much easier to play in
idealized fields, to trace back
to places far away from low pay,
addiction, and drifting apart.

To fall in love with the past
is to pine away, to live inside
photographs and watch them fade.
But divorce has a way of waking
you up like a slap to the face,
like a break in the tape, and
the ends are flailing in all kinds
of directions, and there's no point
in rewinding, not a chance of
speeding forward and suddenly
the present is the only girl
in the room, and why haven't
you noticed her before
with those immediate hips,
those relevant eyes, the sexy
way she demands your hands-on
attention, and the constant
negotiations of what is, what
matters, what we want, and where
we will place our hands. Damn!

The present is not a painted lady,
not a lie you can tell yourself.
You'd better touch the present
the way you want to be touched
because to love the present is to
look around and feel your lungs
expand inside your chest. It is
biting into the apple and crunching
through the flesh. It's only now,
and not remembered, a verdant
musk, the heft of something
in your hand, your footsteps
on a solid path. Work to do and
tools and space without revision.

And imagine that path, your only
path that fades into nothing, crumbles
behind you and at your heels, and
all that is to be loved and grasped
within the periphery of your arms.
Even the branches, the divergent
roads that bat their mysterious eyes
and whisper about undiscovered
pleasures, the misty, violet,
starlit twilight paths that sing
like sirens can barely intrude or
be more than a suggestion, a hint
of something in the air. There's
no love there. Not when you
have this: Christmases and game
nights, renovations and mortgages,
dance recitals and grocery lists.

Poem: April 30, 2019

-kai-

Thirty-five years? More?
And still it's easy to settle in,
next to a fire or across a bar,
and find something interesting
to pass back and forth between us
like some nerdy game of catch.

Our two lives passing and crossing
like rivers, and us returning
always to each others' banks.
A place to pause and look about.
Not even imagining that we
might find other places to be.

Poem: April 29, 2019

ikigai

to put something into the world
that wasn't there before: a poem
or drawing. A perennial in the corner bed.

to honor and prepare the way for the ways
we learn, to affirm that learning is nature,
that it happens where the soil is rich.

to see the world as it is and take note,
to feel the presence that is not me,
to touch stones and flowing water.

to find joy, to hold it briefly in my hands
and to pass it forward before its light
diminishes, to sow sparks.

to connect piece to piece, to draw
lines and raise blinds and find the unexpected
ways we match and align to each other.

to be useful and attempt to live
in ways that others find pleasure in, to give
good counsel and honest effort.

to love and make love known
with every muscle and every breath, to gather
and discover our treasures together.

Poem: April 28, 2019

Topography

I've been mining the same hills
for four months now, longer even,
but never with such conviction,
unearthing shiny stones, one
much the same as another, and
placing them in my pockets.

They might be valued in certain
contexts, but mostly the reward
is local, defined by the limits of
my personal radius. My stones.
My collection. My scratched and
dusty headlamp and my daily
shoveling never far from home.