KBO

          [Winston] Churchill perpetually demonstrated 
          enthusiasm, determination, and optimism—
          if not at all times in private, then at least 
          always in public.
               —International Churchill Society


Whatever else—always charismatic,
dawn sun hitting
the red wet
brick beautifully

on row
after determined column
of shabby-but-
decent apartment buildings—

That I should be
awake to see this!—so often
I admit I don't
often notice.

NO SECOND THOUGHT

Look at it—does
this nearly translucent
luminescent seashell glow

from the secretive
center of it
out to the edges

or is it
the other way around?
Is that cracked

but serviceable
bowl on your counter
for putting junk in

or pulling it out?
Where the movement
ends and the

willingness begins
is no stance
you can take, not a concept

you're taught;
it's just something
you get.

THEN

In misery, them
leaving you.
Them leaving

you in misery. Then
time lapse: suns
setting, moons

rising, that kind
of thing. Seasons.
Blackened bananas

and avocados rotting.
Maggots writhing
in the kitchen. Then flies.

Then nothing
but starlight. Not bad,
you manage

eventually, you
see it: everything
that leaves—returning

just never to stay.
The worst of it
realistically, then

is the days.
Their empty
interminable passing—

only to come
back the same
way again: terrible

but so familiar.
Like a bad dream
in which you

find yourself becoming
aware of having
had it already.

WE DON'T KNOW WHAT WE WANT

Listen how
even the sincerest damn

birds can't stop clamoring
at once

for more and more
worms and yet

sunnier
and sunnier weather.

NOVELTIES

O that tender voice, the prim
lips and smooth cheeks, the warmth
and softness of fingers touching
other compliant fingers—how luxurious,

how beautiful it is
to desperately need
those things which we
cannot afford to need.

Sunrises, sunsets, swaying
gardens of late roses and
lollipop dahlias—all those classes
of prize are different;

not prerequisites, exactly
but novelties, gewgaws—free upgrades
to your basic Food-Water-Shelter-And-
Warm-Someone-Else Package.

Though of course, you
still wind up paying
for every single one of those
too—the presumption being

that you'll find yourself desperate-
ly happy to do so
once you've seen and
handled a few.

UTILITARIAN

While I'm here,
I must speak (when I do speak)
for everything: the blood 

and the spittle, the dust 

and the dirt—which, 

for their parts, may all take their
silent turns wearing me—
not with any sure kind 

of elegance or precision—as in 

pure white gold stud earrings 

inlaid with diamond—but 

with a certain nonchalant-
yet-explicit equanimity: 

say, a well-stretched green

maternity dress—one of many, 

perhaps, hung forgotten 

in a closet—still redolent 

with memories, and billowing 

agreeably (for the time 

being, at least) in the light 

morning breeze.

AUTUMN CONSPIRACY

It's a traumatic thing to witness
the lush and lively thickness of summer
inexorably getting thrashed
and winnowed. We'd have to be
forced, not coaxed, to reckon with
the evidence; and in truth, it goes so
much smoother when we don't notice.
It isn't just that the light bends to
obscure it; the whole planet tilts, and we
tilt along with it. Saturdays, we're very
busy bagging leaves, digging out
the slow cooker; Sundays, folding
clothes, cleaning windows, putting
elaborate lattices on crusts of dough as if
by the charmed wink of a candle, which
we know—but again refuse
to acknowledge—if used to its fullest
is doomed to dwindle. We do not think
twice. We are complicit. We light
it, and we burn it—then, we force
ourselves to squint a little in order to
perceive: there's still just as much
as ever that needs doing before the chili
depressurizes and the big
game kicks off. Even though of
course there's really ever so much less.