IMPROVED TEXT FOR THE INSIDE OF A BIRTHDAY CARD

Cut down your family tree;

make kindling 

out of memory,

because each day you live

will demand the sacrifice 

of at least one small defeat. 

This is not the feeling, 

of course; these are just the words 

that the feeling might be trapped in:

in order to consider 

the trackless ocean, it helps

to be a speck of flotsam—

just like to ponder 

the mystery of your childhood, 

you have to be a grownup. 

But the last thing on Earth 

you will learn 

before you leave it, 

is that everything 

you finally know

will have to be forgotten.

MISSIVE

The reddest 

cardinal in the greenest 

fern tree

as the sun 

is dragged, kicking 

and screaming toward the west;

a streak of geese
whose strident hollers seem 

to ricochet

off every rain-

quickened building 
and slickened city street;

just watching light
as it falls 

through colored glass

and lands 

with a glimmer on 

drab vestibule carpeting—

Alleluia, goes the only 

lyric in the hymnal, who 

would have guessed? 

Sometimes, it's like 

you get paid 

to be impressed. Once 

or twice, what you want

and what you need 

are the same thing.

NEW WAVE

All you need

is love, they said—

and,

as the Earth's 

rotation slows, one might

hasten to add—

supposing 

that the wolves 

have been recently fed. 

MISE-EN-SCÈNE

What if time 

wasn't time, 

but the flow of information 

from the five starving senses

to a full-

to-bursting mind? 

And space, 

the last few stage flats 

of an off-broadway production 

that has already been shut down 

which have yet to be 

rolled away?

What would that 

suggest about the cost

of doing business? 

What would that say

about the price 

of our admission

when we're bitter 

enough to part 

with our credulity, 

but still 

willing enough 

to pay? 

WRITING PROMPT

Dreamt I went 

to a workshop taught

by my reflection. 

He said, in order to be a poet, 

you must ask

the right questions.

What is nostalgia? 

I cautiously invited.

All the memories, he replied, 

with none 

of the hindsight. 

What's imagination? 

I solicited next.

Some hoodoo hex; 

an atomic pile, throwing off 

art like radiation.

what is this purgatory 

where we reside?

Simply a purging 

through repetition, he sighed. 

What then, is heaven?

I stammered, losing patience.

That which lies 

all the time 

outside your vision. 

MODUS PONENS

If lies 

make baby 

Jesus cry, 

what would 

make him 

laugh—the truth?

Would shyness 

soothe? Or 

verbal abuse? 

Mirth is not 

a thing 

to cling too

tightly to, 

anyway, I think 

he'd say. Why, 

seems like just 

the other day 

his friends

ignored him 

til he cried. Then 

flattered him 

until he puked. 

And lastly

told him: if P, 

then Q; if on

our side, then 

crucified. 

THINGS TO REMEMBER

Take it from the grubby 

thirsty sparrows 

singing something 

very like A

Pirate's Life For Me

as they stake their 

claim on the fat 

gems of rain

which are caught 

in wild magenta nets 

of redbud blossoms 

that weren't so much as 

hinted at yesterday:

in the forest, 

as elsewhere, hallowed be 

consistency's name—

and yet, the proudest 

and most 

illustrious histories 

are easily

the shortest.