Peppermint on the Lamb
Nails too short to really leave a markFor necromancersIn german woolen coatsBut the possibility of a scratchIs the only promiseThat keeps the drifting at...
Buying Chalk for Making Milk
Sand of purple powdered milkSalt water teethMaple butter tongueAll moves against me from time to timeAnd the obsidian ocean will lick your heelsSo crouch low...
Handbags
I step off the platform and onto the subway. The doors shut, and when I look around, I notice all the people on board are the most radiant older women with...
I Am Not
I should have been a snare for human connections,Licensed to coddle egos at risk,Swimming in words of praise each day,Drowning in loneliness with each...
The Disorderly Order of the Forest
I gofor the birdsong,smell of pines,disorderly orderof the forestit ownsmysteries, miracles – trees –some reach a hundred feetto the skysome lay across the...
The Bird Watcher
She sits.Stoic.Deciding whoshe wants to bein this moment.The bird watchercraves the bestof the day,like anyone.Knowledge.Beauty.Passion.Meaning.An unabated...
A Week
Frank Stanford lies quietly at restin ground a mere hundred milesfrom my home. Hell, I could walkthere in like, what, a week?Easily, if good weather and if...
Feeling Better
I must be feeling better I’meating out again alone againsix couples around me and as Iimagine what their lives are likein my mind they’re allhappy and doing...
Releasing the Night
You are not leerythe Earth is exchanging signalsrelease, emerge.
I sip white wine with the undertaker’s daughter
listen to her speak about life’sshadows and all we doin search of love. We talkabout all that is buriedthat we live with daily.The undertaker’s daughtersells...
Weight of Earth
Tree leaves bendwith the heavinessof rain, mountainstands by, letswater slideoff. What we doto each otherday after dayis too muchto hold.Even the earthcannot...
December and Everything After
You are in the savor of night’s tempted mouthopen for swallowing dreamsfor I may not survive this waveany more than you have already swumbut I am calling out...
White As Snow
the white of a southern magnolia bloomis a perfect white on white like snowdeeply beautiful & perfectyet fragile in its fleeting beautyonce picked from it’s...
Embrace Loneliness
I am a small bush standing in the desert alone.No trees give me any shade, but I like to lay down in the burning sun.An eagle flies down quickly to me, but I...
Prayer for My Son
My sonUndoneBy Daddy Death & Dyslexia,Has come roaring backSearching for his dream.His sweetness, brightness & earnestnessShines through his cobalt gaze.I am...
Moonlight
I look at the mirrorWhy am I in such pain?As I laugh as if it were okTo watch my tears dry awayAnd be all forgottenWithin my own soulLet me knowIf it’s my...
Revenge
Another OCW Awards Banquet and he had struck out again. Three contest entries and nothing to show for his efforts—for the third year. Every year he could...
How to Write a Found Poem
Think of it as collage, from French colle paste,glue (kólla) + -age, as in mucilage, I’d add,Middle English muscilage musillagemūcilāgō a musty juice, akin...
Two Dogs, Chained
Previously published in ‘Renegade”Wolf eyes, fox eyes,I see you glare at the sunthen wag your tail,uncertain how to begin your escape.Let me tell you the...
Howling Away Our Hats
After Wendy T’s “Crow and Grackle”“… the damned have howled away their hearts…” - WB Yeats, All Soul’s PrayerI read this first as “howled away their hats.”...