this be symmetry—

arthritic man

ice-bent tree

 

where rocks break

stream's flow

a station of my soul

 

ice:

rooted fire

 

pearls once

were water

 

home of shadow,

bone

 

don't all suns hold inside :: a dawn that was never alive

 

            pace

of   the   moon

            pulse

of eternity      soft

            wrist of the sky

on which    side of death

            is rest

 

to hear again one's given voice

the great oak of infinite possibilities

breathes

 

wisdom when a yellowing leaf

fear of the apple set free

stones thrown or left in sleep

the tongue to my words unperceived

 

hear an owl kill

in the clear mind of night

sleep and silence return

two dancers in moonlight

 

whose gospel have i been carrying in my unread heart

shall the ending be bound

to infinite light

 

read me as a poem in blood

swollen with new light

silence with little to say

 

fences failing

posts gone rotten

pasture teeming with moons

 

unburdened of rose :: thorns bleed

 

howling with kindness :: i awakened the tea

 

every night of our vow i shall love you for rain

love's silence :: we undress in the air

who else set fire to the sun today

 

aren't the two halves of my life wind, wind :: and a needle going through

 

what if my father dies

on the day of my child's death

or before i'm conceived

what if he dies

with his back turned to me

 

black truck arrives

as a silence

from a whisper

a story

night

death

its driver

death

its wings

silence

whisper

story

truck

night

 

wind unweaves

soul shapes speech

a new moon's seed

wherever i sleep

awake alone unguarded

 

snow immeasurable

forest kneels

man searches for his heart

 

i wake

finished

it was a long and lovely read

 

as i behold a bell breaking into light    what shall the sleeper hear

 

there is always a voice drinking and dying

            there is always a noisy fountain dying of thirst

there is the naked silence

            of the friend who loves you

a woman releases the raven's feather

            that whispers her name

this Ohio grows old within me

            my body no longer dreams it is a river

 

found a coin

in night's loam

smaller than silver

larger than gold

like you

i am lost

to you

i owe my life

 

in my country there is no longer a straight path.

foundations of home study the way of the waters.

i share a blanket with the man who has no legs.

 

sightless flesh

gathering strength to see

haunted by the moon

am i

 

dawn

the sacred eye closing

dreams journey back to the country of the dead

birds changing place with stars

 

coals burn in cold black sky

cold sky burns within woodstove coals

January

wind

god 

giving birth

to the birth of god

 

reaching the high meadow

clouds making empty music

an eagle 

emerges

 

new snow in winter darkness

death dream comes from nowhere

                    i am a white stone who can climb the sky

 

i remove tarp from woodpile

snow scuds

blue smoke from chimney lofting

into bluer panes of catholic sky

 

deep woods thawing

woods of new england

mistakes of the lord everywhere

 

my boat the moon :: i leave night unlit

 

sun dying

i become

part of the darkness

 

something like a naked limb to count the falling snow

who spreads their wings where grass is deep

who stares from air that cannot breathe

 for how many lifetimes shall the green heart beat

 

empty hands

hold me above

a wind of unknown depth

 

there is evidence of sky in us

knowing the road has injured my soul

peace where waves gathering dissolve

 

the mirrors of her life grow stiff

wooden chairs from barefoot children

a dark mouth on either side of the wound

 

mourners have lost their way to the grave

and the dead waiting

for his death to be put underground

 

how grave is the feast of the diminished garden

how many lives know the solstice of ruin

when soldiers toy with saviors, who dies

 

sunset, i drink the windows just :: like a Hopper she said

 

whatever you carry the sky is huge

 

as each stone leaves my hand, it :: balances on the one below

 

why are we so rarely flower :: to face with joy

 

from the moth a feathering :: of nakedness

listen to the islands, we :: become ocean by degrees

there are planets in her :: steps, oiled and pearly

 

the garden exactly our :: bed's shadow

the pearl that draws you :: unclasped

stop because a :: dead branch goes through it

 

completing a weed :: forests urge silence

bird without a sky :: she cannot arrive

death of the prairies is also :: a man

 

who wrote this :: her mind must be all around

here is my father :: hiding the universe

life, leave me untitled :: encourage my sound

 

walnut, put :: our leaves out first

soul's small lion :: sparrow

crickets, it :: should be obvious

 

is there a thread on the water where we can meet

is there blood where hopelessness ends

how many shall the doves strip of their skin

 

use a sweet knife, love, where i am lost

 

stranger things come to pass than standing in line for time

 

full of the useless

yet i pull a few weeds

study knots on the faces of trees

 

warm sun on an april stone no heavier than a spiral

 

witnessed by watery light that is never not here

you shall appear and reappear

and i shall awaken

 

wash peace from your words

launch a maelstrom

walk through the split in your soul

 

like something yellow you would do :: daffodil

 

blood in the river

blood in the breeze

the safest place to be is lost

 

apple blossoms weighted

with snow

they ask me where we are going

 

thinned by mist

the mountain grows tired

grass quietly eating rain

snowflakes :: staying in touch after death

 

the long sentence of the voice at three in the morning, blameless

 

 

o keeper of darkness, don't we walk into life through parallel doors

 

a man breaks down, but i don't speak about the weight of the stone

 

the cherry blossom

you held out

was you

 

poems just published in tiny wren lit (issue 6) and chrysanthemum (issue 32)!

 

wind blows my fingers off

            small fossils

free of mind

 

            emerging

from a random sky

      a withered tree

 

a child and his face

have all the light

            the sea lies flat

 

five monostich:

the long limbs of human light ascending

a face without eyes the moon spills its sand

an audience reading around the desk of solitude

empty chairs in a cornfield a birthing begins

coming home to the guardian stone

 

an old rain is staring out the window

high in the winter trees

my garden has built a nest

 

spring rain :: fat stones

 

within an earlier melody

unknown outside the dream

are the lands i am and will learn to perceive

 

whose expanse of lake is sane enough

to receive the grace

of winter geese

 

being asleep while two calling owls speak the language of night

            rain's rhythm

dawn chorus

            the river begins

 

afraid of the eclipse :: i was right to be

 

droning engines die

                wind sound

                               vast

 

death of the sun

            tomorrow, eclipse

                        shadow of man, of moon

 

blue-green lichen

            on rain-darkened trees

                            journal of dreams

 

in the last car of the train

            nodding asleep, holding the way home

                        open

 

a rainbow 

            to end the day—

three journeys in last night's sleep

 

three monostich:

dreaming snow last night in different lives

the same bed years apart restored from ashes

small beginning dropped in the night in the soil

 

doves are nesting in a yard i've stopped speaking to

 

opened the window

dropped an ant

into spring

 

no mountains here

            —what is higher

than thunder

 

geese flying

            a pair—

no gazing at the sky

 

in a sweet scented breeze

            i don't know

whose petals

 

using a mourning dove's coo

to quiet

my ears

 

lost the moon

            behind a pine

                        so the day begins

 

long wings

            climbing a thermal

virgin sky

 

rainy skies

            flowers sleep

hazy moon

            flowers dream

 

kneeling

hands in mud

restoring water to flow

 

eaves drip

                        dripping

            the swollen heavens dry

 

            mixing vinegar and water

before easter

                        snow squalls

 

with stems that stood

through winter—

                        here i'll plant my life

 

the wind

the house

i listen to them moan

 

the sun is warm

            the windflowers will

lift their heads

 

under heaven's freedom

            to be stormy or clear

wearing my black beret

 

equinox

            the widower has grown

a new beard