Pick up tomorrow--
put it in a wrestling hold--
to start the new year.

Suffer the upgrade
from mouse to lion--
your market value increased.

Featherdust the sofa,
lift it with good intentions--
January comes....

sail the big shipwrecks
be at one with barnacles
they toughen your skin--
and keep you from drowning

"Away" (from Georgia)

Flash the tunnel lights--
whatever is happening
avoids the rush hour.

In the pews of life
solitude's like a rainbow
thru the stained glass.

thorny the roses--
such a potential of pain--
real or imagined

December 26th

A bare branched moon--
with some icy blue crystals--
thru the Christmas lights.

Like pointy rockets,
pickets in the fence
glare white against the still night.

So pink Teddy Bear,
imagine folly
as the fuzz on your bottom.

Don't talk to Orchids--
they are stuck on their beauty--
talk to Marigolds--
even the bugs like them--

Candle words flicker
as I walk my pilgrim way
to a better life.

Dream a crystal sun--
one that glows with love--
and make it Merry Christmas.

Winter's withered rose--
yet the birds still have two wings,
still flit crumb to crumb.

Freight train pass on by-
with all your rat-a-tat-tat,
screams of steel on steel.

LOVE--thoughts about it--
nag like waves on a seacoast
on a foggy day.

Sun-spangled ocean,
travel me so fast and far
that I always dawn.

Love is like a frog,
ugly until it jumps up
and lands in your pool.

Pick a cloud, any cloud,
and save its sunny moments
for those rainy days.

The long, long, shadows of day-
almost swallow me.
Do I dare the stairs?

Stars that shimmer white
can be made into dragons
by connecting dots.

Rage like rage,
fury like fury---
a sip of wine, a
glance at the orchids,
stains on the sheets:
please remember,
that's not all there is.

It's still a jewel,
that hope that I have no hope--
the whip is mine too.

Say walk,
say don't walk
say every kiss
has four corners.

Pith helmets, white shirts,
standard brown Teddies,
love coming in tablets
through a picket fence,
the inner circles of bragging,
the sky blue, the sea green--
and nothing, but nothing, in-between.

Barbwire the fountains,
let only cows drink--
who eats the fuzzy sparrows?

As the year's end nears,
dawn is an exhale,
Christmas a long held breath.

Yes, friendship by rain,
or when the snow is real deep--
today is that day.

Trees like dead sages,
for even on cloudy days,
the sun muddles in.

When rebellion rears,
remember the rattlesnake--
who is also scared.

Trees like dead sage--
for even on cloudy days,
the sun muddles in.

Win's the warm shower
with a warm towel after
on a cold morning.

Life in a dust-bin--
hidden are the dreams--
that the sweepers always find.

Crazy carnival,
in your mirrored maze,
I throw at the milk bottles.

Lacy, foam-brine words--
words that spill like waves--
will sometimes voice I love you's.

I built a red rose--
gave myself a scratch--
and hollered "reality!"

Mend yourself daylight--
winter solstice comes--
soon you will be in action

Enter December--
under broken skies,
sparrows flit the cloud shadows.

Self-absorbed Atlantis,
imagine all you boundries
as unbroken circles.

Dappled as butter
spread on whole grain bread,
my memories shade, glisten.

With fingers unlocked,
I receive the wine, wafer,
as if it's dinner.

Salute--
to those odd moments
where fire and where gold
are ships whose sails I capture.

love a fading star--
so much dark flows in between--
could it love me back?

In my latest dream, I polished
God with clouds and Tee shirts.
He said I should spit-shine with
a little water, a little polish and
rub, rub, rub.

elusive sparrow
go still for just a moment
let me catch my breath

Grafitti Artist

It's toxicity, the kiss of the spray paint,
the caress of the wall, as if it was the sea,
or a woman, as if it was that bitch-goddess
art, that slippery, elusive mermaid, art.
Or so my imagination tells me, while I paint my
tag upon the wall, my name, my soul on fire.
Art, the bitch goddess--if I'm caught it could
be two years in the slammer. Art....

Clouds

danger is safety
sent to cover me
as if my words were moonbeams

perhaps it was her kiss...
we remember its shadow,
almost forgetting the light it cast

Fishing

Here I am, I've lost another one.
So many nibbles, so many pumps,
so many pulls, so many pushes,
so many words.
For such a small trip,
for such a short, short time.

Fog horn lonely and
the dark toes around me
like a shipyard cat.
"I'm a tawny yellow rose,"
the moon says. I answer,
"yes you are, indeed you are,
and so am I."

To dance, to lift up,
to stroll her garden
like a seed-hunting rooster
cock-a -doodle-do!

Two Poems

The sweet the sour,
some memories like pop tarts,
others like cranberries.

The bare-branched winter,
its unfiltered sun
like a yellow road sign,
one spelling caution or
do not enter or
slippery when wet.

The field goals, the kicked footballs,
the surges, the pains, the hits, the
misses:the goalposts: so white-washed,
so stained, so heavy, so near...yet far,
as if there was no field at all.

The field goals, the kicked footballs,
the surges, the pains, the hits, the
misses:the goalposts: so white-washed,
so stained, so heavy, so near...yet far,
as if there was no field at all.

The out-of-reach stars,
indifferent as snowflakes,
melt away with morn.

Art, like a sincere lion,
invites us to lunch,
has us for dinner.

As the moon pulls her skirt
behind a cloud, the night webs
like a black lace stocking. Until,
with dawn, the stage goes bare.

fear is that clamshell
screaming to be shut
when the heart is all muscle

"castles"

hail the troubadour
singing about the bleakness
with so many rooms

"Satori"

nice, fresh, banana--
skinned like the moon--
not that one can eat the moon

Portrait

November--the unattended baggage,
the wet and slick cardboard, the vacant
lot, the vacant eyes, the sun copper as
the bottom of a gourmet skillet.

Shadows on a
mountain,
not quite true.
I imagine you
climbing me and
I imagine me
climbing you.

This is where the road turns
Tell me why the road turns
To be so tough and tell the light
To go--or to shine--
How the shell powders to chalk
With death, that big eraser,
What the new school
What the new thought
What the dying meaning
Of me:
The sudden blueness
Of my eyes. Gone shut.

Carny Barker

"She walks, she talks, she crawls on her belly
like a reptile. Meet Little Eva-one thin dime-
one tenth of a dollar. Watch her dance the
dance of the seven blue veils, her jewels like the stars-
star--like the one that led the Magi-trembling
yet steady--yes, see Little Eva dance for one thin
dime--one tenth of a dollar...."

Dove into Wall street,
it's only up to my chin.
So I swam, sold short.

I affirm the riverbank.
Baiting hooks with dreams,
I sit and I wait.
And I catch mostly minnows,
the ones running from my shark.

Halloween children,
fluttering like leaves
that scratch across the sidewalk.

Jonah said the fish was big,
and that inside it the decor
was all pink. He added when
the jaws finally opened, the sky
was purple-black, except for
the dead and dying stars whose
light still shone --like spring snowflakes.

Opening all doors,
we pray alone together--
rugged as old barns.

All life's donut holes
remember the spring
when I grew a bigger space.

The moon shines kindly--
hiding the stress of aging--
on the Autumn leaves.

Embroider your dreams--
remind the dull gray twilight--
dawn will come again.

Listen for the poem,
it will whisper-float
like snowfall in the mountains.

dream of derring do--
across all the fruited plains--
lonely as your gun

1) kind words emerging--
like umbrellas pausing rain--
stop the arc downward

2) brown autumn weather
moon a wet ring on the bar
yet a glint of glass

churning, churning the
laundry moments,the stray thoughts
wash washing away

Bulb plant tomorrow--
two weeks short of Halloween--
they unmask in spring.

Lay me darkly upon your river,
feel my heartache across your sea,
your gentle sea.

Street

Please lead somewhere--
to a town or village or a
new realm--and be dusty
about it--I like to bathe.

White long legged crane,
you fish as if for answers
while your legs get wet.

White long legged crane,
you fish as if for answers
while your legs get wet.

plentiful red seeds
as the holly gets ready
for the white season

Siva

October--frost soon--
the pumpkins will make faces
at the harvest moon.

This October comes
like fresh bread in a basket,
covered to stay warm.

Early September,
in the playground children shriek,
the leaves yet to fall.

We, the elderly,
pushing up and pushing down,
elevator ride.

Days like bow strings
arrow-point the rocks
climbed on the hunt.

Weedy field, I bring a
bunch of posies.
Please accept them.

Hope

I left it yesterday,
my cure-all imaginary
rainbow. Left it for dead.
Still, it tries to shine; and
sometimes it does--if I let it.

Lemon colored as motes in sun,
tales of flood survive. Funny how
the rain falls, goes.

Cool September, good time for a hayride
and its innocent kisses. The moon too is
fresh, though soon it will be harvest.

In the deep blue of my eye,
a panther lurks. Entralled,
I whisper stay in our forest,
count breaths like leaves,
count our rings of growth.
Just don't come out. And
we will both be safe.

Come on cupid,
stay with the spirit--
curb that dog you
call love. I didn't
call but she dogs me
anyway.

Cool temps, late August rains,
invade the garden--the Begonias
snap to--the Impatiens brighten,
smile and flirt.

Like the surf,
every day pushes,
every day pulls.
The trick is to
stay atop the
boardwalk with
a funny hat.

The white picket fence is almost dark.
The chain link one is almost sinister.
Even the lowly sparrow flies.
But he doesn't know the joys of the climb.

Crane

Construction crane like a giant stork--
steel beam in its mouth like a fish--
the men looking like cane stubble,
the street festooned with street hooks,
chokers and, as if bordering a pond,
a blue fence of do not post.

Night, with blazing eyes,
performs eternal ripples
and hints of richness far
beyond what my eye can see.

Dandelions

Little towheads,
so insouciant,
so dancing on the green.

The glossy pictures-- 5,10, even 20 years old--
(one wanted to an astronaut, one a model, one
a rock star(two went to college),the 8 glasses of
water a day diet (never followed), the recipe
for orange-coconut sponge cake (tried:horrible),
the magnets spelling L-O-V-E: all sturdy door
items in a kitchen filled with motes of sunny
afternoon dust.

Looking In The Mirror

Soothed by
prolegomena,
I listen, hear
the heartbeats,
feel your pain.
Your speech is
short: you just
say:"I love you"
and you do, you
really do.

For Sarah On Her 12th Birthday

Hiding behind the chopped meat
the ice cream must be lonely.
The ice machine gurgles in
agreement. Open Sesame!

The sun is magic,
a magic morning magic.
The sun is space,
a magic morning space.
The sun is love,
a magic morning love.
Except today it's cloudy.

Naifs

Up the hill,
down the hill--
with nets up--
we chase the
butterfly dream.

Part of the wafer goes to me--
part goes to her--they both taste
the same --but I was hoping for
sugar--Cookie--and a full glass of wine.

Skull smasher, lay it down,
that iron fist, the one saying,
"that's the way it is",the one
only wolves will answer- in the
(your) wilderness.

Gaudy, earthy, chesty the Begonias.
are like antiques, are like beribboned
soldiers, are like dear little old ladies.
Rich ones.

Bob

The hard tin of
the unopened cans,
the words that tumble
like rocks--as if I
was a rubber bullet
that bounced and
bounced. My friend
is ill--the friend I
shop for--and I don't
know how to say love
though I know it's
not something I can buy.

Tattered heart and
submarines
north,south,and out
to sea
dive down to the
bottom
yet often rise for air.

U.S. Army dress green,
the Sweet Peas undulate
over flowers in our Times
Square garden.
Just a tad south, the Army
recruiting center is newly
boarded up. It was a landmark
opened, I think, around the
First World War.
In a few months we will pull
the Sweets Peas...too.

Writing a Poem

My mind tells me it's easy
just be cute, it says, just
whisper--say something
like "in the morning the
clouds borrow gold."But
forget the collecting interest
part. That's too human.

Chess Chatter
When he was losing the Greek would say,
"Please I am from small village" and I
would answer," with goats--plenty of goats--
just like the Bronx."

A hot,hard, double-clutching truckdriver,
August starts, tries-maybe tomorrow it
will say something-about the godly sea,
the cool breezy sea.

I saw she was a savage horse; yet I thought her sweet; a raging, fierce as thunder is fierce, horse; yet she was so lovely, lovely. I knew whe could win. Deep down in my heart I knew whe was a winner. But maybe not today.
He was a stud, one sired by the famous gransire, Willie Shakes. He too was magnificent. He had muscles on his muscles. The trach tout who called himself "the Dauphin" said he was the best bet of the day. The stud's name was Gerard Manley Hopkins. The mare's name was Crowbait.
Of the stud the Dauphin wrote "in his riding, of the rolling level underneath him steady air and striding high there how he wrung upon the rein of a whimpling wing in his ecstasy! Then off off on a swing..."
Enohgh. I had to bet the stallion over the mare.
He lost by ten lengths, he was dead last. The moral of the story: stay away from the track and when you do go pick love over money.

Aging

white says less
black says more
read the Daily Planet
verbs full of marbles
remember acting out?
mouthfuls of cake
biased as a kiss
file your teeth at the door
how to bet the lions?

Humdrum Day

a bow to the new generation
a boon to the ungoing struggle
Custer died for your sins
brother can you spare a dime?
hang in there, keep the faith
RHIZOMATIC--bigger than that-
PLANETARY--with shoots above
and roots below--unusual

Remembering The Beats

Wandering Jew I plant you
with a toothpaste for a smile.
Goldilocks is dead but not in
the movies she is roses incarnate
like the all-white statue of Jesus
on west 33rd. He has a case to
keep off the grafitti. So do I.
Don't shoot me, shoot him. His
glass is shatterproof. So there
America, a Rockefeller salute
to you and your atomic bomb.

Unfurled books--tall breakers-
the keel set. Sail on,Sail on.

a bottle of ale
passes time
half empty

Seaweeds writhe
set to lash
forgotten moments

Intense heat--
I forget day
grows ice blue.

My little choo-choo,
crossing the gorge,
thinks it smokes the moon.

Fishing pent-up butterflies,
lacing them to hooks only
kind acts by others will free.

Marvelous the chuzpah
when my echo dances
alongside my shadow.
Such harmony. Yet the
alligator comes like rage,
is rage.

Little boat--
Big river---
Space like fun-so
Let the rowers row-
Let the herald bugle-
Let the day unfold-
Let me salute the sun-
And you.

My imagination sings tremble
my subway sings steel on steel
and carries me stop to stop.
While I daydream.

Turn, pull covers.
The light leaks
dreams of rain,
kettle drums.

Times Square Garden

Impatiens flow--veils--
the billboards glow--
Begoniaz? Teacher's Pet
arm straight.

ballerina of the diner,
you dance my plates to and away,
your fingers as elegant in motion
as your dance, as your elfish smile.

Marina,
ballerina of the diner,
you dance my plates to and away,
your fingers as elegant in motion
as your dance, as your elfish smile.

Marina,
Ballerina of the diner,
you dance my plates to and away,
your fingers as elegant in motion
as your dance, as your elfish smile.

MARINA
Ballerina of the diner,
you dance my plates to and away,
your fingers as elegant in motion
as your dance, as your elfish smile.

MARINA
Ballerina of the diner,
you dance my plates to and away,
your fingers as elegant in motion
as your dance, as your elfish smile.

MARINA
Ballerina of the diner,
you dance my plates to and away,
your fingers as elegant in motion
as your dance, as your elfish smile.

Dawn-light flits like sparrows,
grows like carrots. The sun comes
without rings. I play my daily
hopscotch: toss, skip back to base.
Except now the base gets bigger
as I let more people play.

I braid the rainbow.
I braid and rebraid it
over and over again,
as if, were it mixed up,
I would not be. No.
It's as if, were it mixed up,
heart pounding, I could
mix with it.

The moon, losing the
tinsel of her lover's kiss,
lets him have his way.

Orchids like flesh wounds,
windows hard to crank,
soil with buried treasures:
all is in the greenhouse.

When the pain's far down,
out comes my blueprint
evaluating heartaches

Working like a dawn
on a rainy morn.
Still the flowers grow, flower.

Purple-blue mountains
like gowns--sunlight like
tassels, moving, dancing,
mortar board tassels--
help dawn graduate.

Like buoys, dandelions dot
the green sea where Herman
Melville is buried.

For sky is gone when
we close the door and
seen through a window
it cannot hurt you.
Peace.peace in this house--
but if we raise the roof
the sky will return.
Blue as always.

If I just look, blooming rose,
and if I just take your picture,
I will not know the the feel
of your thorns and, it that's the
case,I would not be alive.

Shimmering moon, your face painted,
shadow floating free; you left a mark
on Emily D; will you leave a mark on me?

Romantic sand dune,
blow the other way,
for your grit is far too real.

The show is part horror, part comedy.

Red exit lights tattoo the darkness.

The lights go up when the credits show.

Who the hell ever heard of the gaffer?

Old petrified moon,
you borrow light well--
like a dowager's ball gown.

The miracle dream,
the one that holds the diamond,
always seems amused.

Waves rise like moments,
moments rise like waves.

I met a sailor sailing as
he sat upon a log.

He said the stars make
good bank loans when
the dice roll storms at eleven.

Worms, he added, are good
when the trout are hungry,
and if we could fin-swim
we'd be whales.

But only those whales whose
oil is good for light.

Then he got off the log and swam off.

red lead heavy
the color in the waist
of the day this drydocked tug

The sudden cloudburst,
the one winking me
every flowing, flowing, sea.

The threat of the mirror,
unlike the window,
it knows how you look

Carapace,
the dimension
of your innards
is me.
Silky, my dream
of freedom. Silky,
my call to love.

Darkness folds tentlike
while the stars crapshoot midnight
in this great outing

Firefly----
who owns you?
The Milky Way?

The long winter of the new
whispers I love you's
once buried snow deep

The azelias fade,
but will flower again.
The new dogwood,
steadily growing, now
blooms. I water both.


Hitting on midnight-
she wears her feathered boa-
eye shadows her stars.

Stipulate
"thy will be done"
and the dust
will still be dust
but finer,
almost a healing dirt-
certainly a growing one.

Big grin locomotive, your
ties drenched in creosote-
that you do not smell, that
I dare not smell- until my anger subsides.

Catch me, the moon said,
in that window with the new white lace.
Am I not your new bride? If not,
curtains to you!

Good morning, I'm the truth,
please give me a big hug and a big kiss,
for I'm that snow white bird in a dark thicket,
one near that so-far-distant tree. Yes, that's
what I am, that's what I do. Love me.

Coca-Cola colored,
they told funny stories
(these underground seeds)
about how it was to bloom in the light
about how it was to feel redeemed
about how it was to finally breathe,
to finally give, take,oxygen.

Those memories,
the ones that spit on time,
the ones that sail like hubcaps
after a crash
are the ones undimmed
are the ones that blind
are the ones to meet head on,
to talk about before ...

old country store seed packets,
like shimmering dreams,
get tucked in tight drawers

The cannon balls
whistle lightly
above my ditch.
Surrender? But
that only brings
freedom.

"Trooth," she said,
"I'll get you one--
fifty cents. Put a
dollar in the machine
and get two. And that's
the honest trooth."

It battles still-the wreck of me-
Karl Shapiro and his poem
about his new Buick.
Me, a Hot-Rod magazine kid
whose father drove Buicks,
big upper middle class Buicks,
Buicks which were not quite
Cadillacs but good enough
for a Sunday ride to the
Presbyterian church. A
good church to be sure, but
not quite Episcopalian.

Twilight comes
the color of an aging bruise.
The Daffodils have come and gone.
But the Tulips still bloom and the
Impatiens nod and wave at the sun,
the slowly warming sun.

small musical notes
and billowing kettle drums
the cloud orchestra

lonely is the rain
until it joins in puddles
where the birds can bathe

Just a bit of bone, she said
that sometimes gets tickled,
sometimes gets hurt--
though usually it rises and
usually it falls on its own.
And sometimes the it is a she,
one connected to her backbone,
one connected to her wishbone.
One.

no longer the carmel color
of her youth, she is still the
true burlap lady. nor has she
the acrid smell of her youth,
though she is still pungent-
mellow and spicy. but not
the musk-musty smell of
death; she is the odor of a
newly spaded grave. it is now
April and we plant from seedlings
that will bloom fully in May,
June and July. Such is Mother
Nature and such are we who
plant and harvest.

snarled fish
bottom it out

for it floats
oh how it floats!

and it floods
oh how it floods!

and it caresses
and it divides

so it hurts
so it is hurting

plus it takes
but it gives

therefore
it must be love

important the moon
spotlighting empty deck chairs
camouflaged by night

campanoiogy
is the art of ringing bells
yet the TV remote...

Fleets of grasshoppers surround me
as I sport my way to the 1st tee.
So pray don't let me rough it--
there might even be a bee.

knees like coconuts
legs pink as parking tickets
still too cool for shorts

The moon glazed
like a breakfast roll,
and the tulips fruit
their heavy bottoms,
and the snowflakes melt
on leather jackets:
just another mixed up April.

The soul with its bloody sheets,
all those forts hilled with hips,
even the thumpity thump of a bad tire:
who gets a perfect trip?

A tattered old woman,
the sea wind screams
sweep, sweep. And I do.
I really do.

built hot dog fashion
cold wheels to the ground
yet festooned, upwardly

Falling, I lifted up, as if
I was on a plane diving,
but still safe--knowing
that down was progress,
I mean accepting down
was progress, that it leads
to a greater high.

She crowds her sweater
with her dreams:one man
less eaten, one steak medium
rare, one glorious affair.

cold, infertile moon
you make my lion sleepy
clinical our love

Her sweater, lifted, filled,her dreams --one man less eaten, one steak medium rare, one glorious affair.

I gave up my dark walk
and traded it for a piano.
Under my feet I feel petals
and when I push them
the room seems to glow.
But I do not touch the keyboard.
I leave that for ab uno disce omnes
a phrase I found in the back of
the dictionary. It doesn't fit
but it sounds

Position the rain
Hurrying to the door,
so that the circumstances
of getting wet
do not matter.
I open, open.

The knoll Golgothia
visits in the field of talk
on this Lenten day

I miss that daydream
where I, as Charley Atlas
Unbound, step into outer space.
Charley is a good enough guy
but that first step is a real killer.
Let him take it inch by inch.
Please.

sing up the tulips
with their tea cup look
cold as a shot glass today

stiff unbending cane
you argue with the river,
do you quarrel rain?

looking for the monsoon
will dry all my fears
are in this daily planet
like Superman.
I met him once. He was fiftyish,
bald and he had a pot belly.
I asked him how the rain felt
when he rode the thunder.
he answered,"do not judge yourself."

fragile is our glass
and fragile our turkey trot
for the wind is light

picture me on a cloud
different from the rest--
those scattered after game dominoes.
I would paint my cloud not pink,
not red, nor even white but blue to
match my eyes.
And it would sail! Oh, how it would sail!
Not to find another but to glow the
deepest blue under a blue-y sky.
And when my brothers called I would shout
"Look at me! Here I am! Where are you?
Are we not friends?"

Whispering ghosts, those
brine cobwebs of pain,
answer me. They say
love is no ocean. They
say give you a break.
They say more, more.
They say waves will come,
expanding, contracting waves:
waves like my heart.

I measure the coffee so carefully
got to get it exactly right
yet coffee spills over the counter
someone didn't fit the top of the
coffeemaker correctly
but the daffodils are up
time to wash my winter coat
go buy a pair of sneakers

Mooned on moon.
Tonight you start to drop
your big black drawers.
Tonight, I too, am alone and almost naked.
So traveler to fellow traveler,
may we have dinner?

If you are a hawk,and you are a hawk, well,
find your feathers and fly down this canyon,
thia one with global warming, regal hopes,
empty shadows, this laughter canyon, this
canyon of heavy sighs and
if you are man or woman, and you are man or woman,
put your shadows in a drawer, put them in that
empty Danish cookie tin and tape on a label with
masking tape, one that says "open at your own risk"

burnt banana sky
still crazy with dawn
choke your living pain that
great heat of your living pain
then your song will come

stirring, the foaming brine
causing, the foaming brine,
the lacy brine, the swirling brine,
from afar
how dimpled is the sea
when the sun flashes on the sea
the sun warm on the sea yet
always the cold brine of the waves
the ever turning, ever returning, waves.

hunt under the bed
for those trivialities
avoiding your sunlight

Time like a jacket
one tight over the belly
in my twilight years

somber as lilies
we march with our ash
over New York City streets

dreams all in a line
like full shopping carts
before a cash registar

big penis jukebox
you had a long hit that howled
"Play it again Sam"

we fall over the water
like bombs to the sea
yet a spring gurgles

In February,
the sun comes wrapped like a gift
by truculent dawns

love in the raincloud
too dark to see each other
that's what the thunder's for

clouding white our path,
February night,
how deep the snow at daybreak?

It's regal armor,
as if snow was steel,
protecting, hiding, the heart

clouding white our path,
February night,
how deep the snow at daybreak?

It's regal armor,
as if snow were steel,
protecting, hiding, the heart

a dimpled winter,
one with a small ray of hope
lighting the stained glass

from inside the church
the ring of the bell
may awaken those outside

the small looking glass
found among the beach debris
sparkles most with dawn

tempered by the wind,
the steel of sunlit winter
cuts across the day

tulips sprout their blades
as if to melt away cold
with a show of force

incoming tide rips
smoothing out footprints,
erasing the sandcastle

move towards the forest
it has quiet in abundance
plus places to hide

sing a noisy song
one that fills the quiet space
between now and then

look up to the sky,
make an arrangement of clouds
one that matches your heart's

face the gold tiger
the one you found in your soul
and feed him good steaks

rock rolling my toes
down the street without walklights
a journey to the end

the risk of living
open to the gusty wind
that clears out rainbows

pleasure is a turn
behind the oar of the boat
love? the spray of salt

this wid-winter thaw
out of cold New York City fire
spring sinews of life

let the night go peek
at all its distant shadows--
the sun will differ

birth a starry star
welcome it with courage
let it have a heart of fire

hold the moon tonight
I came with tired legs
and I'm looking for a ride

The sun touches her
pimples all over her face
shy the ugly moon
yet the sun touches

my heart is a field,
father, after the harvest
give it time to heal

in love for a night
snowflakes fall like pillow down
soon will blanket too

moon a silver fish
swimming against the current
dark clouds like pebbles

If I were a king
amid the dandelions
I would plant a rose
and when it lashed out with thorns
I would trim it graciously

The calms between waves
the ones that fan out on beach
calms that sooth the rage

creep up on your dark
and let it know your full name
morning will bring light

listen to me heart
you are the super foul up
no, it can't be me

creep up on your dark
and let it know your full name
morning will bring light

listen to me heart
you are the super foul up
no, it can't be me

flowing in their gowns
the silver stars dance again
as the moon retreats

sunning on a hot tin roof,
polishing my dreams
how hard the wind blows

a rose without thorns
growing in the wilderness
such is Sunday morn

The delight is me
carrousing with the tulips
still buried in winter

the mountainous search
with the mind always clanging,
that love is valley

wax sealed the jam jars
still warm in cellars
despite January chills

love like a saber
between me and the tigers
with their yellow eyes