untitled

my mom was cut
low by

mantel cell lymphoma
blastoid variant

on five november
at 1015 am

she was already
gone by the

time i got to
the hospital

i got to her room
& she was alone

peaceful

still warm
her mouth open

eyes closed

the sun was shining
through the window

i kissed her forehead
slid my fingers through

her hair
held her hand

sat in the chair
next to her bed

sat quietly
prayed

pulled the sheet over
her chin

raged a little against
death

but then remembered
st paul:

where is your sting
oh death?

my mind turned to the
spiritual

a feeling of peace &
comfort filled me

she was out of pain
& no more fear

death: a blessing
the curse of sin

defeated

for mom

churchill once said
'if you're

going

through Hell
keep moving"

yes true
what do they

always say in
war movies

when the shooting
starts

'keep moving forward
don't stop

go
go"

lean in
against the

stream

dukes up

what happened to the poet
where did he go

the full throttled
barbaric yawped
poemwriter

he is lost
gone

kaput
unresponsive

in the ether
& disappeared

night

at midnight
rain

lightening &
loud crashes of

atmosphere

hail bounces
off the window

& sirens wail

the universe
crashes about

like a small
child with a toy

clutched in his fat
little boy hand

screaming for attention

playtime

everything is right angles
geometric

sharp corners
halvetica abounds

today i sat
on a dark grey
chair

watching an escalator
people rode

up the escalator
down the escalator

when you are young

when you are young
and full of poetry

when time is but
a fancy and death
an ironic inspiration


when idle moments
pass into idle years

and you are tested with
a sea of yesterdays


you will sit
and you will wonder

at how everything
that
is

now was

last night

i awoke last
night, 3am

stomach hurt
burned a little
too

went to the fridge
drank a few mouth
fulls of milk right
from the carton

shuffled back
to bed

wide awake now

my white cat curled
up tight on my bedspread
glowed subtly in the
faint streaming light
from the window

crawled in bed
trying not to
distupt the cat's slumber

i lay there
mind going
too fast for
my own good

the creeping fear
of uncertainty clawed
at my subconsciousness

the rednumbered digital
clock stared at me
reproving

rolled over on my right side
facing the wall

prayed

i think
hoping to fall a sleep

my stomach
burned a little

bunched the
pillows around my

head

squeezed my eyes & willed
sleep to come--

it played coy

a muffled throat mew told me
to settle down

i tried

sleep played
hard to get

in an instant

part i
in an instant a sleepy town
is swept into a muddy sea

tens of thousands of quiet
disasters unfolding into a scream

part ii
6000 miles away
across a hundred restless seas
unexplored mountains
and terrains of the unforgotten
and unfulfilled

a man smiles as his grand
daughter takes the first of many steps

part iii
he wept when they arrived

a story of hope, the newspaper said,
notwithstanding the empty shirt
in his trembling hands
(where once his wife had been)

part iv
later, when the last of the
candles shuddered under
his grandson's breath

the man struggles
to stand

and walk away

12 hours from Midnight

Smiling and yes! I arrived
In dawn
Along the edge of a
Speckled road.
It was gravel.
My tire iron, spark plugs, and
Ignition timer were
Also gravel.

I walked here from Winamac.
An arm-sling hoisted my arrogant.
I walked here from Winamac!
12 miles after I set out from
Midnight. Now this morning?
This thing breaks the scuffle
Of feet on the speckled road?

Now
A where else?

So I'm here,
Giddy in the tight jawed morning.
I can't wake up
From being.
The arm-sling
Shifts its load
Of unfired bricks.

I am 12 miles from midnight.
No other thing
Rears
Its challenging shape.
The stars grow into far.

I cannot curl
Into a bed of
The speckled road
Where I seek sleep.

Dan,

The incorruptible are unattractive and
Clearly invisible. I never see them.

The corruptible fill the hedges
Of this neighborhood. They
Take the place of curtains, and
Hang from my walls.

They start life as gentle landscape
Reproductions in heavy frames.
In two years they are beautiful
Women in swimsuits.
In four years they are beautiful
Women not in even swimsuits.
These things take time.

Or they are born as acid loving
Hydrangeas which make white
Snowballs in summer.
On my suggestion of
Aluminum Sulfate, next season
They shout blue snowballs.
A third year later, and
They are bald cypress.
These things take not as long.

Do not worry.
You can free yourself of all
Corruptions by speaking only
Italian for a year, drinking
Moon black tea on the back
Of an elephant, and
Marrying the first underage Polynesian
You meet in a burning warehouse.

The action in the lines of just

Everything is a math of
Rough sex
And Hawaiian guitar,
Delco radios and midnight
After driving
In the leather Mercedes
Open to through curves.
Good things when they are at their best.

And Nurses: tonight no more needles – just –

The television crawls between the patterns
Of films. A steady flickerings
Of Oscar winning roles
For difficult women (on screen and
Off goes the joke).
We spend all of hey laughing.

Your fingertips on my wrist – just –

There is not a cave with enough
Deep. Even hiding in the cave
You are found
As the voices make echoes.
The lights shine in after you.

Put your lips over my chilly mouth – just –

I have a confession.
The summers did not happen
As I remember them.
Instead... I did not fly.
I did not wear laurels.
I did not advise
A future that would actually come.

Run the fingers of your fingers
Over my chestbone – just –

That I think if anyone, you.
There is a math to be created.
Visualize the entrance of numbers,
And convert them to dancers,
On point,
In a train hallway.

Press me in an urgent way – just –

More than slumbering occurs
While I am neither
Wrapped in Irish arms,
Or in a cradle of Irish earth.

The Hawaiian guitars
Assemble their pitches, and
Mourn on stoney peaks.

The Rules in a Perfect

The gables of houses align
From one block to the next,
And from porches beneath them hang
Two person swings painted white.

A breeze would cool them.
Marigolds also would shake
Their yellows.

The cars are quiet when they pass.
There is no thump of music,
Or unkept muffler sounds.
The sky is undivided by the
Vapors of airplanes.


I promised these mouthwords
At the refuge camp in Nigeria.
The mothers stared at the gospel
Of my words. We filled out
The immigration forms, and applied
For vaccines,
Until the camp was strafed
One midnight.

The agency flew me back
To Nairobi. In the neon
Dance clubs, I peddled
My winning lies
To the braless girls
In skirts and sandals.

The Afternoon of Savannahs

A lion in crave with nothing.
The springbok are fleet, and
The hartebeests already gone this season.
The sheepish things that don't live here,
Don't live here.

A lion in a crave without
Spending the afternoon in a pant
Under a heat of brush.
No scents in the wind, and
No springbok, no hartebeest, no creek.
The land is wide and unlush.

A lion in crave with
A brown blood dried flank
Poached poorly by a caliber,
Then hiding away
Under hot brush.

With thirst he went,
And went away.


A lion without crave
Was tracked in his skin
By a boy who watched
The sky swagging birds
As they dropped
To the heap
Of his nodding slump.

With words like 'terror,' and
'History' can you reduce
Other words like 'Leopold,' and
'Milosevic' to thoughts that will
Slip between your fingers?
That they would fade away?

You've read it in a book, and promised
To bring it up to people
Who will appreciate the atrocities
In a heartfelt manner.
Even if they are drinking white wine.
Then drive home.

Something about Rwanda?

Sleep with beautiful women all the time.
Millions of them.
Until it refuses to end.
The heartfelt atrocities here
That don't kill many people.
My beautiful vehicle.

Refusing to breakdown bones although
They are breaking.
Muscles cramp like steel.
There are other traumas and atrocities
To consider
That can be reduced from
A score of charts
To laconic chords,
Or 'terror,'
Or 'history.'

Somewhere the garden,
Somewhere the trumpet,
And neither being played.

If Morning Had

I was as good as then,
And weary of these a.m.'s.

The first break of bright across
The street trotting east.
A morning. Another.
A way to wake and feel
The candles in your feet
Are burned out burned.
That means the light, too,
In your hips is dim.

And though she's only a whisper
On your arm,
She is tired.

The dogs are in their nightclothes.
Apparitions are back in the wall.

This, with sleep in its
Bruisy eyes,
Is the sockdolager
Of your life?
This doppelganger,
Shaped like a sack of change,
Is your life?

May as well go back to bed
Before the guilty voices wake
And rattle the trees outside
This drowsy boarding house.

It was not a decent thing, not
A decent way to do it.
There against the wind
On the side of the cabin.
I pulled her hand into my hand.
The sound was her shoulder
Scraping the dry panel
Of shutter
As she came to me.

It was not a decent way,
Knowing she loved me,
That I pulled her in
To smell my chest.
Felt the ripple of her body
On me.
Felt my bottom lip
Against her ear.

It was not decent
With my hands around her shoulders,
Or her tip toed feet
Reaching to me,
Or so quiet her breath
Reaching my jaw,
That I could not love her at all.

But with the pine
Smell in the woods
We lashed our bodies together.
The perfervid swag of time
Held us until morning.

It was not decent
When she was gone
And I wished she would stay gone
The rest of the spring.

Definition 1

A poem
Is me buying a
Fifth of gin from Andy.
I've known Andy seven years.
He knows my first name, last name,
And ex-wife.

It is illegal
For Andy to sell me
A fifth of gin
Without first glancing
At my driver's license.

Two, sometimes three
Times a week,
Andy first glances at my driver's license.

I also buy lottery tickets.