Tuesday, September 30, 2025

NOSTALGIA

It's the way 
the slightest 
autumn breeze 

fans the blaze 
of summer's 
faded green—

tugs at the frail 
leaves of 
memory's trees, 

reminding the penitent 
who now brace
for winter

of a distant sea 
of aquamarine,
placid and reflective 

of those skies 
above of endless 
daylight,

and that humid hum 
of bliss which seemed 
to overlay each night

and sing the praises 
of everything 
it was in life

and the legend 
of how it would 
come to be 

eventually  
so fondly mistaken 
for everything it wasn't. 

Monday, September 29, 2025

ROOMS TO LET

There are no exceptions;
any love 
that comes to us 

is a love that must 
sooner or later go.

This much we know, but
to make it 
even more deceptive, 

think of all 
the disconcerting 
aliases it uses—

pity and self-
loathing, 

pride and fear 
and avarice. 

And notice, when all 
of these feelings 
flea, 

how each one
inevitably seems 
to leave the same way—

at roughly same speed, 
and from roughly 
the same place.

But luckily, as those 
who've invested 
in beauty can attest,

beauty is not a feeling;
beauty is a space.

In fact, it's the space
where all of those fugitive 
feelings were living;

and, of course, even after 
a fugitive leaves, 

the place 
where it was living 
stays. 


Friday, September 26, 2025

CHRYSANTHEMUM'S THE WORD

Frowzy mock-flowers
of beat-rug orange, 
attention-deficit red, 

and afterimage yellow—
cordial, but ragged 
as the coming autumn clouds; 

they do not offend 
with their brand 
of hocus pocus, 

nor beg for our attention 
like high summer's 
neon dandies—

because, although 
too impregnable 
to be moved by the wind, 

they know, 
deep in the closed-fisted 
swirl of each corolla, 

that it's too late 
in the year now 
to hope for a perfect body 

and was always 
just plain foolish 
to wish for an unblemished soul. 


Thursday, September 25, 2025

NECESSITY

How I've grown 
to resent you, mother 
of invention—

when I fear 
I lack the courage, 

your intention 
is always 
to rush right in 

and suckle me to sleep 
on wisdom; 

when I say 
I have a problem, 

you are quick 
to dispatch it 
with a solution. 

But although it's 
all very timely 
and clever, 

therein lies 
the contraction: 

what you give 
so freely  
is the answer; 

what I crave is 
your attention. 

Wednesday, September 24, 2025

THE ANSWER

It's what the angel whispered 
just before 
you were born—

and what you'll presently 
foolishly fritter 

your life away, 
scorn by scorn, trying 
to remember: 

like all you encounter, 
she'll be simple 
to understand

until you start 
to love her. 

Tuesday, September 23, 2025

JUDGEMENT DAY

To help make sense 
of eternity's math 
equation, let 

the afterlife 
be equal to 

endless equivocation. 

*

The real first sacred mystery 
is that, after the creation, 

god would find himself 
of several minds 

about seeing his image 
in the mirror again. 

*

After listening 
to their speeches 
and sermons for so long, 

they start to sound less
like accusations 

and more like 
clever loopholes 
or contextual breeches:

in heaven 
you'll be surrounded 
by familiar faces—

the only difference 
in hell is you'll see them 
in bewilderingly 

unfamiliar situations 
and places.


Monday, September 22, 2025

NO MATCH FOR MY INTRANSIGENCE

How could I be 
like the sea? 
When I'm angry, 

do I grow, at once, both 
overlarge and hungry; 

Do I heavy myself
ceaseless at the grungy 
rocks of reason, 

then blot candor's sky 
with the foam of my fury, 

withering grace 
with briny excoriations  
at the rational edge

of each shore 
where I go? 

How could I be 
like the sea, I repeat
and demand 

that you answer me—though 
I don't want to know.