11/26/17




the driver of the chestnut mare is waiting like a friend
black cart quiet
the wind you’ve become



11/25/17




today we cleaned the gardens for winter
left smoking piles of disbelief
dug up a crescent moon



11/23/17




i hear the clatter of nothing falling
at midnight in the kitchen—
my wife wakes up, dies
sunlight weeping from her eyes



11/19/17




sat through the storm last night
            wondered where all that rain fell—
tight roof, sound mind, eternity chasing its tail






freshly made, i twist in the wind
            snake skin returning to an earlier molt
            the dark in a dog set to howl



11/18/17




a catalpa leaf bares its teeth, rakes
my face over and over
makes blood flow clear as water






i stand naked in the wind this morning
sky flies backward toward a sun
darker than light can see



11/16/17




like the child up in a tree
staring lost through swarming leaves
your being has entered the dream



11/14/17




squirrel will be killed again yesterday
there on the road—
whose future measured by the number of feeding crows



11/12/17




moon whimpers
harvesters slit the night
father cannot find child in the stubble of the field



11/11/17




the night i wasn’t conceived
still stirs the mind—
blue leaves gently coming loose



11/10/17




the calm face is in another country
another world—
we walk from Ohio to vote for it






the joy of motionless motion
comes after death
when you are the morning every ginkgo leaf falls






traveler sleeps late, hurries away
neighbor outside raking dreams
answer the ringing phone with imbricate possibilities



11/7/17




my face slides off in a November rain
swirls round the circular drain
sucked into the moon






rain before dawn
dawn ends the dream
the rain could be starlings, or not



11/6/17




my skin is old
thin
you can see to anywhere through it






cracks in my ceiling
close themselves to hear
footsteps of moss on the roof






when the fly on the screen
            crawled out of my eye
                        there was an entire world to build



11/5/17




a little sunlight travels
from nowhere outside
lies down in the gutters i clean



11/4/17




one leaf
will be enough
to drain all branches of wind



11/2/17




the act of alone
is giving birth inside me
she holds one ginkgo leaf in her hand






my silent womb
your useless wings
each life leashed to its unreal binding






she stepped into the water
a stone without skin
felt for the first time cold winds