October Velvet

Nothing satisfies the weary spirit

Such as the velvet of an October eve

Freckled by reticent sprinklings of rain

Which thicken like traffic on the ritual commute

Dull and murmuring from hours held on high

Cheeks of the sky flushed with the advances

Of a devilish chill, insistent, persuasive

Reflect on the browned mirror of the mountains

Color their dying eyes with a final surge of joy

Before the well-advanced annual condition claims the upper hand

The pearlescent opaque winter mists

Seep across nose and mouth at the peaks’ final breath

Cool the cheeks of the clouds into tones of frostbite

Remind raindrops of the cozy, homey quality

Of the final smack upon welcoming pavement

Massasoit’s charcoal figure, pensive, pipe in hand

Watches the sun sink into exhausted slumber

The furious rain slides down his nose and cloth folds

Twilight poses a challenge to sharp sightless eyes

Tacit, in memoriam he holds, as the autumn chill settles into his iron limbs

Great hulking shape

Great hulking shape
Lurking white in the reaches of darkness
Tribute and inspiration to the fixtures of Egypt
Barring the stars with the crag of your shoulders
Muzzle raised to the sky, square jaw taut
You hum a growling hymn to the absence of winter moon
And the valley tremors timorous beneath brief feet
Swathed in ignorance to the ways of your kind
Ever present, from the first break of the horizon
Enduring, to the final minute of time

Theories Obsolete

Where does your care come from?

For it may be the low gray walls of my little mind

Impeding my eager view

But I cannot make it out.

Is it labeled desperation

From a cyclical falling out of love? 

Addiction, perhaps

To that gentle tug of needing. 

Or does it taste of breath

Shared in close comfortable confines

That settles in your nose sometimes

When you go to sigh? 

Or last, and leastly plausible

Could it conceivably be

That you have seen between my lines

Heard within my mumbling

And you are truly attracted

To the texture of my soul?  

Hollows of trees echo outside themselves

Hollows of trees echo outside themselves. 

Twigs sway like beetles flipped downside up;

Premature snowflakes suspended

Glisten above the dusty curtain clouds. 

The mountains are surly, buried as they are

Up to their craggy chins in an orange woolen blanket. 

So many things sigh all at once

In a low, lowing chorus;

Grass playing host to parasitic frost

Loses its forced resolve, and yields

Beneath the soles of my firm flat feet. 

Curled carcasses, leaves laid with care upon the concrete

Like small animals unearthed from hibernation

Rustle their brown and gold shells

In semblance of life, but they are gone in a puff of winter impatience. 

The bite in the air is one with malice

One that targets the open parts of my jacket

Works its way up my neck in shivers and goosebumps

To set upon soft thoughts drifting in with the night.

Victim to curved claws and grinning canines

Once and together, they fall to their knees

Too weak to fight the farmer’s battle

With weapons of will against frost.

They drop confessions from their scarlet chapped lips

Of bits of sparkling soul, harvested thoughtless

Taken by excess of intention, not so much permission

And an overlying mist of selfishness.

In the same breath they speak

Of pieces relinquished

In tribute, in payment, in an accidental fashion,

Like trading suitcases at the baggage claim.

A misread of the internal print

Has incurred a feeling of loss at both ends.

A feeling of seeking, of sailing

Through the wet, white air

Over the broken grass and tragic leaves

Over the sleeping heads of mountains

Brushing aside the cirrus drapes

To float unencumbered between the snowflakes

That at this proximity, shine more like stars

Magpie

Magpie
Soaring on wires through stiff-jointed boughs
This is the first I've seen of you
Sharp eyes and clever beak
Fingers that grip and release without a scratch
But somehow still a trace remains
A shadow on the yellow face of the leaves
Tell me with your graveyard gaze
Are you to be my raven
And I your hopeless poet?

Paper Pieces

As I walk, I drop

From my right hand

So many paper pieces of a picture in shreds

An ellipsis of small white sugary dots

I trust that someone

Who happens to see

Will happen to be so thus intrigued

As to trail behind, bent like a willow over the water

Scraping fingertips upon the pavement

In his efforts to collect these little litterbugs

Cupped in the crease

Of a hand, between calluses

They mount in a mound

Of careful packed snowballs

Concealing in each a concrete pebble core

Of letters in a ransom note treasure map: 

I write poems

And I step out of bed on tiptoe

I have a freckle on my hip

And I try to be free with my smile

I like feeling small

I am scared of my closet

On a given warm night

I sit hours on the stairs

And more, and more

My hand is quite full

I trust that someone

Will take time, take care

To unfold each piece for each piece’s sake

All we all want is for some other soul

To form constellations from our stars

Time will tell, but just as well

You look as though you have curious fingers

To Listen

May I ask you to relate
Every piece of your life to this very minute
Every fog-minded morning, every dream-minded night
Every fear from twin bed years on
I have a bed waiting empty, and empty to stay
I will sit at your lips until the stars nod off
For the mere fleeting thought of your face
Or drop of your name
Floods my mind with the scent of your clothes
This is very important
Please, build me the man inside them