parent, poet, husband
pithy
i feel like the doctor
who wrote between
patients
little scraps of paper
poem scribbles
his silent ink voice
unbandaged
trickling out
Category: Poetry
Puppy
not even seven pounds
brown tannish fur wiggles
on grassy earth underneath
her tiny feet
little pools of pee
on hardwood
yellow circles
warm when wiped
barks like a high-pitched
fox, in her crate at night
hops with June sun
life just begun
Hockey
frozen water holds the weight of winter
reflecting moon, scarred by skates
frenetic lines, puck glides without
a mark made
hard circular rubber, a speck
existing, cold on the surface
then slapped by wooden fiberglass
quick journeys forward and back
drops of sweat
melt the ice
Nothing
I just sit in bed writing
sunlight keeping the ink
visible
a close study of nothing
only the idea of trying to
have
an idea
Being A Nobody
Emily Dickinson admiring blog
Clever
I used to care
About
Them
You don’t know me
But I know you
Trying, dying for
Fame
Not me
Flamenco At Home
wooden guitar, Paco de Lucia flat on a screen
the bitten apple underneath his frozen image
Iberian music partially fills the house
without speakers he is far from me
sitting at the center of our victorian
the dining room table, my desk where words appear
between my son belting out songs he learns from
tv, while my daughter talks about the dog
we’ve decided to have join our chaos
our domestic bliss
before baths and bedtime
they swirl and nip like moths chewing sweaters
devouring dusky light
energy wanes, finally they take the stairs up
I stand barefoot, wooden floorboards warm my toes
in Sloane’s room, above the oven
where the chocolate chip cookies were
just baking
I stare at her snow globe collection
Capri, Virginia, Asheville, The Nutcracker
Alexa playing songs that I don’t know
almost 30 years ago it was
TWA, me on a plane to Madrid from JFK
before I knew his name, before the Moors
and Hemingway, before phones in pockets
his voice, his Algeciras
dead 4 years now, wikipedia tells me
the cassette I bought that summer
a rectangle of non-compostable plastic
sitting in landfill somewhere
the house is quiet now
only black where he once was
sleeping children, the wind outside blowing leaves
like memories trying to take flight
Capri
Manicured ladies in stilettos navigate ancient smooth
stoned pathways, corridors assembled during Roman times.
Their legs, butt cracks, and cleavage pattern the night,
wafts of perfume mingle with the smell of grilled
octopus and cigarettes.
Some cling to tan wrinkled arms
of sugar daddies, men with white chest hairs
attached to fortunes drenched in cologne.
I never visit the island for Gucci or Fendi,
air-conditioned square shops of consumer luxury.
The purring cicadas surrounded by sea
are my siren song, blue water darkening as it journeys
to Tunisia. Pulsating, my calves quiver up and down steps
to Villa Jovis where Tiberius reigned supreme, decadently
tossing the unwanted off cliffs into the watery
chasm of time.
The ruins sit unaffected by sun’s sweat dripping
from my elbows. I rest in pine tree shadows, imagine when
Neruda was here, arranging verse in his head. Away from the glitz,
everything is as it was, as it is, ants, jasmine, laughter
of the old women who were born in Capri,
born by the sea.
I’m on it again, the Facebook, as Zuckerberg first called it,the guy who doesn’t believe in privacy. I’m here with the photos of lunch, landscapes, selfies, the everything, the nothing, on a flat screen, on a computer, on a phone, it notifies me, assures me that I’m not alone, together with all my friends, who I like.
We brag with our images about going to Hamilton, riding on cruise ships, meeting celebrities. We want everyone to know, that we exist, have money, status, are real Americans. Compulsive clicks show we care about the environment, the presidential policies, the status of women, and we do care. We raise funds, promote books, films, cuddly cat videos.
Curated, we pick the best parts, the worst parts, the wars, the almost wars. The screen is our battlefield, our competition, our attention already waning as the electronic ink disappears into the next post, the one that will mean more. We’re here, together in this internet-tethered world of distracted connected humanity, crossing continents, fragmenting minds.
