Poetry

On one side of the tracks
you sense the change of scenery:
the bones of branches, then the buds,
then the tents of summer green.
Not so on the other side. There the
chainmail bares its dull, metallic ribs
on the chest of its coarse and hoary hills.
You wake up on a train table among
a pride of purring Lionels.
You turn the dial on the transformer
until the conductor jumps onto the sleepers
with a megaphone to warn the world
that he is NOT from Nottingham.
He effs and blinds to the Plasticville walls,
and drops his darts
on tracks between windmill
and interchange
before shuffling off in a huff

I’m slipping on soap
in a vision’s shower.

The tiles look teary
through the steam.

Water rises ankle deep.
Sink and mirror disappear.

Snow is falling on the TV.
Fires are raging in L.A.

Now the kettle wakes
and whistles

just in time
for tea.

Rust spots stain
my faded chrome.

My handlebars
veer left.

Gears that slip
and brakes that stick.

A seat that wobbles
riderless.

A few loose spokes.
Both tires worn.

One peddle
sniffing dirt

I dreamt of that man’s
body as a falling animal,
draped in heavy cloth.

       I knew, somewhere,
       that by reaching him I could
       be young, enough to live.

Between us were mountains,
thickets dotted
with lavender and rosehip.

       In the hillside, churches
       carved into earth so that
       even the spires fell

below the tallest grass,
each with ornate windows
drowned in shadow.

       I would call out to him,
       this man of sharp bone, but
       the sound arrived too late,

finding only the air
that held his shape, dropping
away with the sun.

Sitting on the edge of a summer scene
so my cigar smoke doesn’t bother anyone,
watching the kids flop in the bouncy house,
the invasion of uncles pulling their legs,
the aunts: an admiring seashell blocking the driveway,
and a council of grandparents
seated in beach chairs on the lawn.
Now that the sun is setting,
nobody has to take breaks inside,
though the AC is still on.

As the sun slips lower, the grandparents
will blink off, one by one—streetlights
showering their spots with shade.
Uncles and aunts alike will fizzle from sight,
ceasing their dreamy orbits like fireflies,
who do not know it’s night.
And then we will be the next to go
when the sun sets completely on this summer scene,
banding with the elders’ darkened glow,
making our presence felt with shadow.

from Moledro: A Suite for Lost Literary Magazines

Straightforward, the view from here,
to spirit’s tincture, a mixitini matrix,
the mad hatter’s melusine. At the corner club,
diverse voices grift uncut thick jam word gumbo –

intellectual refuge, for the sonorous;
for weekenders, the hellroaring review;
a soft cartel lost in thought,
untied shoelaces of the mind –

dialogual human noise,
a joyful acapella zoo.