SHAKER DANCE

Outside the old stone 

white church—drenched 

in cold November's 

crumbling afternoon 

sun—the western 

wind rattles proudly! his plainsong 

through bald stacks of 

adjacent 

black 

sycamore branches—

Glory! he cackles;

Glory! Hallelujah, America!—

can at least 

still make some snappy old-

fashioned—

American music!

ELLIPSES

Most of the time

we're all 

so completely—inscribed 

by who

the heck 

we are—

that we couldn't possibly! swing 

eccentrically widely out-

side of the thing

nearly enough 

to describe it's rough 

shape or its

color 

or weight or intrinsic 

design—even if we tried;

which—incidentally

or more

circumstantially-

speaking—we do—and do 

desperately—

for all

too very 

much of our most of our

all of the time—

THIS POEM IS THE PATCH-BAY

There's hardly anything 

like a transparent 

little—for the sake

of which—

to softly nose a 

quick pinch 

of—significance 

into so many—cold stacks of pretty

knobby

and stiff candy-

colored equipment.

INTERCOURSE

See with
pity—the silvery
blind man

shrewdly tapping
towards the bus stop—forced!

to engage
the whole world
through only the outermost

tip of his cane—but wait

a minute—how
is it

that you do it?

ULTIMATE PUNCHLINE

Reams 

of their poems—or of drafts

of their thoughts—or of words 

of those thoughts—only just 

written-

out kind of 

ugly 

and—then

tossed! or perhaps—torn

to shreds 

of—such—fresh smithereens raining!

down, but

like—what exactly? exactly!

like that!

Yup—like 

streams, yes!

like streams

of fresh autumn leaves cascading 

so 

as to be—? carefully, no

devoutly!

observed—by an eye and perhaps 

some kind 

of lucky sun? Or—so as to be

just

re-

possessed 

fresh and reprocessed

into much 

smaller

and kindlier! 

kindling for thoughts—to be scrupulously 

scooped-

up and laid-out and then, of course, possibly—

completely

renegotiated later.

For the sake of which—

all poets

are learners—not teachers.

#1 KOAN

Aren't 

you—

for-

getting 

something?

CHROMATIC SCALE

Up and down the rainy

busy highway, all the hardest-

working colors—the kelly 

green of sheetmetal 

signs, the pale man-made 

grey of roadways and skinny hyper-

reality yellow of thin lines—stand cross 

and stiff—foregrounded 

and jealous—

of the drooping mangy auburn

that slopes to grace those 

loose tresses of trees—and the quick 

shocks of ad hoc persimmon 

that hug scads of shrubs swaying 

listlessly off in the foggy 

and trivially 

pretty periphery.

Why is it?—they grouse,

that some streaks of light 

are damned to be so

plainly—

seen all the time?

While others just get—to hang back

and shoot, pretty vaguely

for some truly amazing—

incidental scenery?