THE HARD PROBLEM

We like to think 

of our thoughts 

as cosmic objects:

true, most of them 

are space junk—orphan 

asteroids and comets 

with tails made of dust 

debris, and ice chunks—

but a few bright ideas 

really capture our attention, 

and we call these 

main attractions 

stalwart stars 

and pilgrim planets. 

But we mustn't forget 

that, from masters thesis 

to default-mode chatter, 

all of these are really

just disturbances

of matter 

in the vast and untearable 

space-time known as 

consciousness, 

bending it and warping it 

to their own 

obtuse purposes, 

but nonetheless always 

so hopelessly embedded—

so enmeshed in the limitless, 

and purposeless fabric 

which is alternately

known as "what it's like" 

and "how it is." 

FROZEN ASSETS

Rife with 

the numb white of ice 

though it is, 

the grizzled old 

December wind 

can't quite 

erase these last 

riots of leaf color—

such fortunes 

of mock-gold 

and ember-red treasures 

as my forebearers 

greedily burned 

down the world for 

now cached (as if 

under glass) 

on the stiff

ice-shagged branches, 

soon 

to disintegrate, yet 

transcending all transaction—

an unprofitable sight

with the year 

almost done

which is 

current to all

and currency 

to no one. 

CODEPENDENTS

You know 

this body 

will betray you 

like Judas—

if, that is, 

your continued use 

does not undermine

and undo it first.

It's less 

a game of chicken 

than a suicide 

mission, which 

neither of you 

can hope to win—

and yet, 

neither can cope 

with the other's 

refusing.

HARVEST

With most of this 

city still bugged-

out for environs 

in the moon-

swallowed wake 

of another Thanksgiving, 

I pause 

to regard my growing 

streetlamp celebrity—

my analog feed, 

which keeps 

blowing up—

not with follows, 

but with paw-

tracked snow; 

not with tweets, 

but caws. 

WHERE WERE YOU WHEN I MADE THE WORLD?

I do not want 

to ask that question; 

what I want is to stand 

underneath 

and inside it—

to feel it accrete 

around me like a pearl 

around a grain of sand, 

until I'm not the one 

who is doing the asking; 

I am the one who is 

doing the accretion—

dancing like 

dust coalescing 

around 

what wonder 

must be lost 

whenever we seek an answer; 

when we sellout 

our attention, 

or turn it upside-down 

and watch 

the nothing that was in there 

fall back to the ground.

AUTOPILOT

After each 

alarm, the precious 

interim 

of boredom.

A carapace of dust 

begins to form 

around the plangent 

call to self-harm—

but unfortunately, 

also around

the one to self-

report. 

*

It manifests less 

like destiny 

than cruise control 

or autopilot. 

After a while, 

you feel blessed 

to have no choice; 

Never mind the abyss; 

you have gazed 

at the on-and-off blinking 

lights of you life—

those phased 

rhythmic stutters 

of your days and nights— 

for so long 

that you've become 

hypnotized by the sight 

of repetition's ocean, 

where thoughts don't dare 

to delve 

for fear of drowning;

where all your burdens 

still exist, but 

seem to lift 

and drop themselves.  

YOU NEVER KNOW

Suppose for a moment: 

ambition's not the issue. 

Short of money, looks, 

and the privilege 

of ambivalence, 

what on Earth else 

could be wrong with you?  

*

Growing older 

is like binging 

a riveting 

series on Netflix, 

desperate to know 

what comes next—but 

in reverse: 

all of the whispers, 

the taste of their lips—

even the texture 

of that fabric 

on your fingers—

disappears; it

starts rushing backwards 

in a torrent 

as you sit there 

transfixed before 

all you never learned. 

You realize (for instance), 

watching found families 

back away from one another 

and old lovers shrink. 

and smooth-out. and weaken, 

that all along, 

you'd been too glib 

or hasty 

when you said you knew love;

what you really felt 

(or thought you did) 

was loveliness 

mixed with safety. 

*

Skin blushes, 

sugar rushes, 

pleasure felt in rhyming—

how much of this 

would still be important 

with the Great 

Lakes dried-up 

and the west coast 

in the ocean? 

You cannot be sure,
so you'd better list 

everything.