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