Tuesday, April 30, 2024

BEYOND ME

There—in that 
green space 
where the freshest light 
goes streaking 

through the morning-
spangled branches 
of the still-trembling trees, 

past shabby fields 
of clover and weeds 
where the lawnmowers 
will not go, just to land 

with a gleam 
on the distant heaps
of pink blushing brick 

where even my 
vaguest interlocutors sleep—
that is the place 

where, one day, I 
may come 

to believe, 
without artifice, 

in life 
after death—that is,

in the life 
of this ardent reckless 
world to come 

long after mine 
is done. 



Monday, April 29, 2024

APOLOGETICS

They say discord 
is the spark 

from which the bonfires 
of great art start—

by which the smooth 
and cornerless light 
of perception

is permitted 
to scatter, and our 
awareness to increase. 

But many are we 
who'd ride shotgun 
for the dark,

who'd just as soon 
disown 
our own sentience 

if it meant we'd 
never have to hear 
the disharmony;

we'd rather use and use
to the point 
of abuse 

that which we already 
think of as "ours" 

than so much as 
show respect 

to our hatred 
of the new.


Friday, April 26, 2024

MYSELF

Let me say: words won't 
explain our relationship. 

In your presence, absence 
itself turns impossible—

turns over and under 
like the infinity symbol—until 

God himself 
could no longer tell 

who is under who's wing,
or if there's any 

difference between 
remembering and knowing.

But I think I've finally 
come to understand 

that remembering bears 
an inestimable cost:

whatever I think you are—
that's what you're not;

whenever I look, 
I can never find you; 

whatever I grasp, I pass 
through like a ghost.

But the act of my looking 
is the way that you teach me 

that to seek 
is to meet—you 

can never be 
lost.


Thursday, April 25, 2024

NAMES

What are these 
dispassionate 
yet fundamental ciphers,

too old to be 
cherished, and yet 
still considered treasures;

imperatively 
given by dead-
ends to unknown futures—

helplessly passed, in fact,
from one breath 
to the next;

holders of the keys 
to these perilous 
identities,

so charged-
full of significance that they 
can hold no meaning;

uselessly impervious 
as gem-encrusted 
coffins, yet

comforting to recognize 
as stillness 
in the morning?


Wednesday, April 24, 2024

EASY COME EASY GO

We like to assume 
such abiding 
designs, but 

the promises we make 
are just so many 
shiny dimes:

begged from 
the stern, old,
and affluent Actual 

by the curious,
bold, but impetuous 
Possible—and then 

flung with delectation 
to the depths 
of a well 

in great hopes 
that the latent return 
on investment 

will redeem the grim
fate of poor 
President Roosevelt.


Tuesday, April 23, 2024

OLD STANDBY

Despite our patter
of protestations 

that we're 
all obsessed 
with novelty, 

it's pattern 
that we really seek 

and feel the most 
at home in. 

Rhythm gets our 
motor going,

while rhyme 
feels like a cup 
of sugar 

our best words kindly
lend their neighbors.

Is it right 
that we derive 
so much succor 

from design? And—
if there were 
a difference

between right
and common,
would it matter?


Monday, April 22, 2024

SÉANCE

Would it be 
more odd 
or less 

if the dead 
did not 
leave us? 

Anyone's 
guess. But
my sense is:

a ghost 
at my disposal 
who always 

stayed the same; 
who always 
remained 

in the place 
I expected;
who never

changed clothes,
or the expression
on its face 

since the day
I watched it
pass 

would have to be 
the absolute last 
thing on Earth 

I would ever 
seek out to ask 
for advice.


Friday, April 19, 2024

TENET

O, to just have faith 
enough to wake 

and stretch 
and dress and 
emerge—

not with great 
exhilaration, but at least 

with nothing specific 
to resist. 

How much of our 
art—how many poems 
have wished this? 

How many of their lines,
burning in their 
earnestness, 

have yearned, 
like us, for this great 
and useless beauty—

for nothing like 
purpose, skill, or 
magnificence—

to be organized 
and named

by nothing but 
the date,

and justified 
merely by declaring 
they exist?


Thursday, April 18, 2024

LAST WORD

We like to think that 
matters are settled; 
we think we have the facts. 

But what we think of as 
the final truth

may only be 
the middle—or even 

the beginning—
and brief as 
dew on morning grass.

Can you picture the universe 
before it was set 
into motion? 

How about the Earth 
devoid of all creatures,
before it even had its oceans? 

It's far simpler to hope 
to glimpse in a dream

the ancient races 
and their poets; the joys 
and burdens they would carry;

the paths that they would trod. 
Next time you seek
a final answer, think first 

of all the wildly different 
names they must have had 
for god.



Wednesday, April 17, 2024

IN DEFENSE OF QUIET DESPERATION

Once in a while, I 
grant you, revolution's 
a necessity. 

But most 
of the time, my 
tremendous sensitivity 

would like 
to argue it's 
too messy. I'm turned off 

by the turmoil 
and the violence 
which is crucial 

to make a clean 
break with The Current
or The Senseless;

I don't want to long 
for the change 
I need to make 

with such passionate 
defiance that I'm 
swept up in some coup;

I'd much prefer to 
fall in love with 
what little I can do.


Tuesday, April 16, 2024

TO APRIL

The great rabbles
of clouds in your 
quicksilver sky—

confounding,
combining, 

compounding
one another—
are somehow 

less foreboding 
than the ominous way 

they loiter there
all day, holding on
to their rain.


Monday, April 15, 2024

CLIFFHANGER

If this were a movie, 
we'd think 

we've been shortchanged. 
And no wonder: 

the storyline's
meandering; the moral
won't cohere. But 

though we're alone in this 
cavernous theater,

and no one 
would be the wiser, 

the reason 
we haven't yet 
gotten up and left 

is simply because 
we can't—at least, 

not the we 
that we think of 
as us

See, somewhere between 
the start of the picture

and this particular 
maddening scene,

we've failed to notice 
that the plot 
doesn't matter.

As long as we're here 
to watch it progress, 

this life, 
by necessity, must 
be bereft 

not only of a happy 
or ambivalent ending—

but any 
ending all-together. 


Friday, April 12, 2024

AFFIRMATION

Your duress, though 
intangible, is a matter 
of fact. 

It may be less material
than, say, an egg 
made of Fabergé, 

but still, there it 
sits, every bit
as intact 

and impeccably 
jeweled with the pearls 
and enamel 

which you forged 
with great care and 
fastidiousness 

in the just-as-
immaterial furnace 
of your stress—

and yes, just as 
lavish and loving-
ly constructed—

perhaps not quite 
as elegant, but
every bit as frangible.


Thursday, April 11, 2024

SEDIMENTAL FEELING

What were the magic 
words that formed 
the world? 

For an instant
most mornings, I suspect 
that I just knew;

but soon, there's a tide 
in the ocean 
of my mind 

dragging out to sea 
all the things I think
are true—and then 

washing mixed-up bits 
and pieces of them 
right back in again—

until most 
of the detritus I can 
see along this beach 

is made up of stuff 
so self-
similar and small

that it's impossible 
for me to count 
each individual particle. 

The best I can do 
is try to put 
the view to use

and give 
one collective name 
to them all.


Wednesday, April 10, 2024

HOLDINGS

It's impossible
to know 
at the very beginning 

what you'll eventually 
discard 
or outgrow 

and what is worth 
clutching to your soul
just in case. 

It's like how 
you still think 
abnormally hard 

about whether 
to toss 
that pickle jar

which you haven't 
thought to open 
in over three months, 

or keep it there
for three 
or four more 

just because 
you have 
the fridge space.


Tuesday, April 9, 2024

EKPHRASIS FOR THE PIN-UP GIRL

Even solid gold 
comes off messy 
when it glows 

from its post as 
the trove of her hair—tangled 
in the bearing 

of all that she must know,
too highly regarded 
to be tamed by a comb— 

as she gazes 
out from underneath 
all that wealth without a care,

eyes less daydreaming 
than floating, just above, 
or possibly below 

some effortless truth
about the nature 
of allure 

which you or I, being 
cheap and human, would have 
foolishly discarded.


Monday, April 8, 2024

SHADOWS

For almost as long 
as there has been light, 
something has been there 

to get in the way of it—
casting its absence
as a twin left behind,

a piece of the dark 
in the shape 
of its essence,

recognizable 
in an instant, built 
out of absence,

and showing us—we 
who pace late 
in our bedclothes, 

we who blockade light 
ourselves with these 
bodies—even less 

than these shadows, 
even less 
than the night. 


Friday, April 5, 2024

NO ASYLUM

One would think,
with the obdurate rain 
clouds now parting

and the light drizzling down 
like honey 
from the sun 

on the glazed city streets 
which now glisten
like tongues, 

that you too 
would get sweetened, cleansed 
of what's wrong. 

But in truth, there's no 
asylum in a world 
that routs its flaws;

it's a dirtying feeling 
when you sense 
you don't belong. 


Thursday, April 4, 2024

ALL THAT JAZZ

Is it possible 
for life to be both 
enjoyed and endured— 

for the little you have left 
to be the most 
for which you hope? 

The preachers
say no—that our purpose 
shall be known—

while the politicians
split the vote by angling 
for an either/or; 

but the rest of us don't 
bother sending soldiers 
to that war, since 

we already know 
the answer: sure, that's 
what music's for. 


Wednesday, April 3, 2024

SYNTHESIS

We're bred 
to think ourselves slaves
to affection—

to assume what we seek 
above all is closeness. 

But in truth, what we 
crave is a strange 
combination 

of intimacy 
and its close cousin: 
remoteness. 

Perhaps that's why 
in centuries past, 

brave men 
would helm the sterns 
of great boats, 

and sail off Earth's edge 
into waters unknown, 

only to yearn 
for the first sight of land

and dream, 
beneath rapturous 
blazes of stars, 

of supply 
and demand, and their dull
lives back home.


Tuesday, April 2, 2024

CONTINGENCY

Like a ratty old chess set 
whose bishops got lost 

and long since  
were replaced by two 
snatches of cloth, 

or a rusty stock pot 
with a frying pan cover 

that's too trusty 
to replace, even 
at trivial cost—

so too can a heart 
still be jury-rigged to work, 

even though a few 
of its parts 
were snatched-out

and stolen,
or mislaid, or intentionally 
tossed. 


Monday, April 1, 2024

DUMBFOUNDED

One would think 
that understanding 

would look different 
than bewilderment—
at least 

from the outside—
but the truth is
that it doesn't. 

The truth is, it looks 
exactly like you: 

stopping short, 
gobsmacked 
in front of a shop window 

at the sight of 
not the twin—not even 
the shadow—

but the stranger 
who's depicted there, 

thick, cold, and 
impenetrable. 

It looks like you losing 
and gaining sight 
of the fact

that a gap 
can take up space
and mass—

that some level 
of reticence 
is always plainly visible—

that certain lacks 
can feel solid—
almost vast—

and even when 
they're slight, 
you still 

might find them 
quite unbridgeable.