after Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House on the Prarie
I’ve tried to be pa,
lion locks and strong frame,
unironic frontier goodness
and unfaltering purpose,
his family-man fortitude
honed sundown to sunup
over a hand brushing a sweaty brow
and an honest day’s work
is measured in the loaves of wholesomeness
cooked by a woman whose heart
would only be his, and eaten by
three ruffian angels, […]
The lady downstairs
doesn’t know where she is.
She’s standing in her dining room
looking out the window,
but where is that?
Her african violets, tiffany lamps,
fine velvet chairs,
the lovely painting she
created years ago,look
familiar. And did she phone
the doctor to come and talk
or was that yesterday?
Her not knowing is seeping
through the ceiling
into my head as I wait
for your call, so […]
His life ended
in the midst of our love,
a happy man just seconds before.
I smile and remember,
praise life with him,
connection and all we shared,
thinking of our daughter’s beauty,
many lively exchanges,
an essay on the duality
of human nature:
the grandeur and misery
in us all,
We had thorny choices
to make,
whether to buy a home,
write a thesis,
proceed with surgery.
Or go fishing,
gaze at […]
My muse has her cheeks pierced,
And her shoe laces loose,
But carefully placed, as to avoid
A sudden fall.
And around her perforations
are perfect circles of pink make believe
covering what I rightly suppose to be
skin of an unworldly softness.
And how I wither, submissive
To an artificial rhythm unworthy
Of her marvelous beauty.
The frailty of her voice,
The frailty of her words,
Add […]
four in the morning here, noon there
no longer night, not yet morning
disrupted circadian rhythm suspends me between
two continents severed by an ocean.
No-Man’s Land - that surreal stretch of urban pavement
width of Brandenburg Gate
within shadows of construction cranes, skeletons of skyscrapers
erupt like tectonic plates from Potsdamer Platz.
like a passenger thrown overboard
I clutch a buoy, breathe in […]
