Summer Breaks

The abating rain 

stained the wasted blacktop
bluish—now, 

insidious
humidity encroaches

emboldening

young shoots to pry
and widen each blushing
crack—still coolly

avoided 

by each sprite schoolkid

sagely 

for
the sake of
mamma's back—

Concavity

Harried woman

vaults another

rote imperative

from the lobby

counter—bids me

have a blessed day.

I wonder—are we

really building

the kingdom

here together?

or merely

—jazzing-up the vestibule?

Tickled

Shuffling past mumbling

lawnmowers—the smell

of freshcut grass drifting 

thick on humid wind 

floods my nose and 

smears me out in 

space and time to

every lazy lawn I've sat on—

brushing spiny 

blades, I'm itchy,

blushing water-

melon red for picnics 

parties concerts backyard 

football fireworks—all

while walking straight 

ahead but plainly lost 

in the best of all possible 

worlds—fertilized as such 

by the actual mulch 

of nothing much.

Fluid Dynamics

Watch—another 

windswept clot of greywhite 

teeming clouds 

cram the sky and gird

to burst—

and pelt 

wet heavy essence down 

on so many 

mudslicked grey-

green surfaces 

that currently—

seem anything

but thirsty.

Not for You, Just at You

Peeking sweetly over 

the patches of low 

clover that swept to meet 

the edge of the road,

a few taller slender necks 

of green stood bobbing in 

the breeze—each blind

gust casually animating 

their lazy pretty heads.

Part of me lept 

and thought he wanted

to seize and give them all to you—

but the rest just 

enjoyed allowing 

the simple white 

and yellow shock

of coy daisies to go on peeking

bobbing waving wagging

nodding—just

like you do,

just like 

you do, just 

like—hello, 

yes sir, thank

you, right 

ma'am—you

do, you do, 

you do.

Perfect Balance

Between hard

rains—the easy

paddle of

a few mallard

drakes—softly

caucused near the drainpipe;

stark against

the loose greenapple

moss and muddy

brown ripples of a shallow noonday

pond—the crescendo

oily silent

grey to shock of deep

emerald

falls and hits

my bobbing retina upsidedown.

Real Feel

Bracing contrast of crisp
morning makes things 

more immediate—

first the trees—
forest-
green in empty
light—the sky

air-clear and
cool
as unobstructed wind—

then the smell—lilac

colored bushes reeking cleanly
of pure lilac—

then myself—seeming
to nose

and notice each 

with ripe proximity—exhilarating
pangs of deep

hunger—not in my
stomach but deeper
down—deeply all over

deep and crying
out sharp and
hot from each
quivering ligament—

Pomp and Circumstances

At 10:15 the clock-

work pretty

pair of pastel boxes

splays and cramps the countertop—

persuading aimless

crowds to pause and

populate the dark kitchen.

The airy celebration invited—gaudy

cheer of polka-

dots in pink and

orange adorning glossy windowed

cardboard streaked

translucent and snug with sticky

favors—seems rivaled

only by the stark

solemnity of its participants—most

of whom can't help

begrudging—as they stuff

their willingness to be—handcuffed

by simple rings

of pure fried cake.

Flourishes

Oh—how

fast!

and far spiraled barbs

of gooseflesh swept

out when my 

mouth

first

took a large

bite of that ice cube—

Quickening

Though something deep

inside me quaked, I somehow stopped

along the storm-

flushed path to work to wonder

for a minute whether

the first man sitting 

in the right chair working 

at the best time pouring 

over clean paper gleaming 

in a bright room musing could ever 

come out with the preeminent thing concerning  

blithe beauty of birdsongs, or about the spaces inter-

rupting fence posts, or maybe

some stony analogy regarding our 

selves and lonesome desiccated pine cones—

but just as quick, I dropped 

the thought and figured 

I'd just as soon find out and hurried, somewhat 

sweaty, toward my building

to find the nearest, cleanest, brightest

public toilet to perch on.

On Tenterhooks

Outside—the stale 

tulips drooping, peeling 

one 

by flaccid 

one 

beneath the supple arms 

of maples 

shedding reams of 

whirlybirds that auto-

rotate 

gently on the humid breezes 

punctuating

each new bout of scattered-t-storms-likely.

Inside—clean faces growing

restless at grubby 

classroom windows, 

a couple dozen 

supple necks look craned 

to crave those outdoor 

days undying—their cheeks are 

starving

and greedy to be 

smeared red, starved

and blazing

to slurp the flimsy flesh of 

cool melons in thick shade

while 

Chicago's All-News Station

drowns 

comingled in the background 

with distant

low-harmony of lawnmowers,

and other rumors 

of responsibilities which are not theirs.

Diversion

On a Monday, the horde 

of greasy flatbeds rumbles 

through the another suburb, converging 

on the early 

vacant lot—packed 

to capacity with fiber-

glass, filthy 

wood, painted metal oxidized 

orange

purple greens you've never seen

with bulbs 

affixed and wires streaming,

bulging big under tarps—they've 

come

again this year with prizes

to build a new light city for laughing, 

a fraud

we can all believe in, teetering 

atop the glitzy ripoff carnival slide so unreal,

so wonderful, so dizzy- 

strange, your gassed kid

will never even ask you how it all got there.

Acumen

If the bible's 

right and the 

very 

first idea was light 

and the rest of things 

just 

kind of streamed out 

from there—then 

it sure stands

to reason (especially

in so Edenic a 

season) that the 

very first ideology 

probably 

wasn't very heavy either.

God of Bosworth

From a veiled 

stoop with skinny cigarette
drooping—the crazy old man

bids good morning

and ignites a silver lighter, kick-
starting the idle neighborhood.

At once there are
the sounds
of motors turning, birds alighted on
poplars singing glory to the power-

washers lambasting the brown-
stone—and all around, the scrappy
choir resounds

his scrawny hymn for him:

let there be
doubleparking!—and sympathy 

for steep embankments!

wireless home phones to the busy-
bodies framed by dark picture
windows!—spillproof 

lids to the late-to-work stout-
hearted; and strolling

beignets 
to the pastel silk-shirted!

Guess Who Has Two Thumbs And...

this 

sort of

wretched 

fast

rapacious 

thirst 

and doubled-

over 

pale-

pained imitation

hunger

circumscribing 

his

advance 

on proximate

dinner—

curses

to whomever 

first possessed these dumb 

prehensile things!

To Get to the Other Side

For an infinite 

minute this ageless 

morning, the itchy old

thoroughfare yawned and waited—chafing 

to abide the callow premise 

of listless geese 

crossing easy through the soft 

shade flung down by young birch trees 

on their way to leisurely late 

breakfast, latent 

punchlines—

an adjacent 

hot lawn, sumptuously 

buttered with dandelions.

Ordinal

Okay, 

let's see—

first is all 

the things you

aren't doing;

second's 

all the ways 

you're not okay;

third is 

all the words 

you've got left 

over—

after

adding 

up the 

things 

you'd 

never 

say.

At Present

The small flowering dogwood raining

its petals—perfumed

white confetti 

falling noiseless and lightly 

topping the tall turquoise-

shaded lawn and so

and so on—a mild panoply of 

blank spangles turning

in simple wind 

in patterned angles—covers all 

I've ever meant to say 

about Wednesday.

Pas de deux

A pair of languid geese 

reclined

and slender in grassy sun

seem to know this blessed

game of breakfast best

and chide me gently with 

mellow trumpets 

as I walk 

unbuffered down the path 

this hungry morning—

someone to eat with

trumps nothing 

to eat.

Iced Tea Weather

Hey I

mean it—quit tickling 

me 

all you itchy 

blossom breezes warm

buzz 

of bees darting lawn-

mowers sunny 

rumbling—

I really

have to 

go to the bathroom!

IDEA OF ORDER WHEN KEY WEST IS NO LONGER A FACTOR

Make a song

that's long

enough and rain

might come

and fix your lawn

and green

your garden

plants and swell

the proud retention

pond with its loud and

tall-talking fountain.

But first

things first—you can't

forget

to water

the watering can.

Intimations

There must be

someone out there making money

off this peachy 

currency of green leaves, sweeping

broadcasts on the popular

breeze.

Surely, verdant 

makes a nifty buzz-

word for new keenness of 

grassblades growing ever greener—sharper 

fodder for higher

definition.

Even dirt-

anointed clumps of 

rebel clover seem to swell

for want of snappy slogans—one nation 

under oaks—and each exploits 

in me a lightness,

too unsubtle to have come unbottled,

too unbridled

not to flow—a rushing 

cache of advertisements,

brought to you by 

everywhere—oh can't you just

smell it 

in the fair-

traded pearblossom air?

Three Cheers

Here's to 

love allowed

by spaces 

within thin

deep thick you—

here's to 

life reaching

from all your 

reaches to hail 

the power 

of a pretty

passive vessel—

here's to those

who nourish without 

striving, who flow

without going, who

wrote this 

without trying;

here, 

from those 

who swore 

they'd drive 

back home 

to you today.

Of Course

You're my right 

hand pointing

to the watch on my left

wrist, and I'm the heart

of you.

Like a good heart, I'll only 

die once, I 

promise—twenty 

minutes late;

 

right 

on time. 

Verbs

Stirred to start 

by living
wind motivating smell
of acrid-sweet wet

wood—I leaped

from bed and left
and ran a mile
or more through mist—no

records no coffee
no pullquotes or crosswords;

it felt like

a whole new kind of vocabulary—

moving
but never moved

doing but never really
done.

Aspiration

Here and

there I went longing 

for the forest—

up and down 

Division projecting finches hopping 

happy in the mulch.

There are no fresh 

starts 

out here—only ends 

of planes which are lined 

with more planes edged 

with shops dotted with 

plots planned for rows of eventual trees— 

but walking circles, every 

pull must be a push;

every breath, 

a rush.

Homologues

It sounds 

the same, but 

being alive

doesn't quite 

look 

like living does—

take this 

bed of cockeyed 

tulips, craning

like crazy 

for a sip of today's 

arcane sun—

they may not know 

how to talk about it;

I may not know how 

to stop.

Lang Syne

Ascending heavy 

stairs this morning, Kate

and I started lifting

switches to dispel the hazy 

still-life of the empty kitchen.

Soon, the sweet humid 

fumes of last night's cooking 

oil—still clinging to the thick taupe

drapes and glazing 

the slumped hardwood—started mingling

with today's fresh promise 

of husky coffee brewing—impressing 

with their airy fading

kiss of former tastes (neither frivolous 

nor significant now) a timely 

reminder—of no past

but the one our present makes;

and no present that isn't wholly

invited by this space.

Putting on the Brakes

Car windows flung

open, I'm light

as a shadow—zooming

past flickering skyscraper 

patterns chucked in my 

path by new boldness 

of sun.

Then suddenly

stuck—by the 

circle, I'm struck,

inhaling deep May 

morning air in 

frustration,

when a smile breaks marking 

mild re-apprehension—

as the weather 

warms up, the west side 

gets packed

—with the smell of burnt 

chocolate.

Before Blazon Days

Shrill crazy 

call of slaphappy 

geese—bouncing off 

blacktop, argent 

glass, sun-luminous brick

facades;

this must be what Taps 

sound like 

at mid-morning—

a giddy death 

of day's very 

first idea—of itself.

Anything Goes

Early-ish morning,

when the air is light and 

thoughtless and the widening 

sun still feels streaked 

through with faint 

filaments of night-air cool

and your senses start

to swell with caffeine and

the smell of cut grass 

and the wholly original sight 

of those waxy young hydrangea

leaves in sun outside your front door—

that's when you'll feel hungriest,

desparate and reckless

to yoke the woods and

moved to make the soft-lit brick

buildings and birds on your block

do pretty rhetorical tricks.

But eager as you are,

and quick and young

and seeing silver everywhere,

you have to remember that

today was always here before you;

so you have to be careful what you ask it for.

Even at this early hour—nature 

always always always

says yes.

Vis-à-Vis

slow greening of parking
lot trees in May 
makes the quick cardinal 
easier to see

but harder to look at 
en route to punch clocks—

is it really so 
much of a stretch to be 
spread on that distant buttery 
lawn instead—snoozing safe 

and lucky, loosely guarded by blushing 
company of tall 

tulips, 
and maybe 
a few bees skimming 
lazy through the swaying neighborhood?

Popular Digest

It's the same

old back and

forth with you, red onion—

when you're

cooked I can

look right through

you but you might

as well be

yellow—

you're prettier raw

but hard

to hang out with.