all the news reports recommended that i stay indoors

well, if you're feeling sinister

girl, fragmented 2005
he was on the verge of the atlantic
where the coast is lined with small
hotels and families on vacation

when he met her: smiling girl
with sun-browned limbs and
a curious, lopsided smile

he remembers her now only
in words, adjectives, snatches
of descriptions used in retrospect

("blue eyes" or "sand-colored hair")

he feels he might be able to form
a picture, part of her face or
possibly a more crude vision,
girl bent, fishing for a dropped
object in the waters of a hotel pool

spine prominent,
swimsuit white,
and wet,
nearly too small

and, if not in words, he remembers
the scenery surrounding them: palm trees
balmy night-air, ugly tourists with veined legs
and ugly swim caps

he remembers saying goodbye,
the way she squinted through
dollar-store sunglasses to maybe

catch a glimpse of him
in the backseat of his father's car
because he was waving

hoping he might embroider
upon his thoughts or eyelids
her image
but only remembers

"hand on hip"
"waving lazily"
"yawning, i think"

//

2005
a cautious journey
of your fingers begins
as they stumble
through the heat
and your hand chases
mine
through a bright
desert of castle ramparts
and tickles the sand
sleepwalking
through the sunlight
echoing off
the chrome
of my father's car

like a stranger in the city of myself

tripped up
the stairs
on
my
way
down;
over shoulder
comment to
everyone
watching:
"i'm
just
a
bit misplaced"

//

she dreamed into me
filling me
with the ghosts
& memories
that still remained
tenants of her thoughts.
sometimes
i think i have a chance
of catching her
and then i hear
the faraway sound
of a dj
giving me the date
and time
and a top 40 hit
comes on the radio.
good fucking morning
to you too

always the wrong way

i couldn't wake up today

7/26/06
i hear the twang
of someone's sadness
played
on a steel guitar
somewhere
down the street --
i am followed
by the music
like
a dog trailing
in the wake
of my travels
following
at my heels.
but the song
is not in my head
for it evolves
constantly
into newer music
into newer misery;
i am not capable
of holding such sadness
i remain an observer to it
only someone who
has known a great deal of things
can take such melancholy
and twist it to make sounds
so baleful
and i have learned very little
despite being taught
very much

//

5/4/06
i go there still
if not to dream of you (and the time before)
then to pretend that i am
to see daylight glint off
the faded manes
of the carousel horses
to cup my ears
for the sounds of children's
laughter
that sometimes still haunt
the place
like gleaming ghosts
and i watch the horses' eyes
cast to the sky
to make silent remarks
on the shapes of clouds
and their brighter outlines
do i think of you
when i think of childhood?
to think of you so silver
young & gleaming
of the brighter days
before the war

//

3/14/06
it is nearly spring --
the promise of warmer weather
and rain
looms like the last impatient notes
of an interrupted song
and i am ready this year
my hair is dripping with melted snow
and is waiting to be wrung dry
bones ache for the warmth of april
winter-cracked skin
preparing to bronze
and freckle

//

wind
wind teases hair
breathes salt air
on skin
as we set up chairs
in the sand

//

"this is the difference between us"
she says, putting her hands
over mine
to trap them there
the way i have been trapped;
to anyone else
we are talking about the weather
and it is raining
but we smile like the light
is pouring in for the first time after winter
in the days where you cast off gloves
and can feel someone
holding you
for more than warmth
"you want, and i need"
and it is raining
and my gloves
are in my lap

//

2005 #1
chills run their fingers
down your spine
until your skin
is a forest of bumps
and shivers break like waves
across your limbs

//

2005 #2
the wind
screams
a
hollow tune
to the air
which carries it
outwards
and
transports
the
sound

//

2005 #3
this renaissance
does not
come
lightly
but it does
come
and with it
brings
redemption

//

2005 #4
there is a certain sadness
reserved for loneliness
which presents itself
through boredom
and empty,
rustling fields
under a drowsing,
lunar eye.
gradually, as one
removes himself
from the city
the streetlights turn
to stars
buildings to burnt trees.
the low rumble of
aircraft
is rare and fantastic
like the yawning
of a giant
in a small boy's dream

summer

6/23/06
each summer the last summer. -denise levertov, "living"

each summer the last summer
the only remembered summer
in retrospect
the one so eagerly
anticipated
& then so uneventful
like a puritan striptease,
a withered erection,
the kentucky derby:
Each summer the summer
most sacred
Each summer the summer
it did not rain so
much the summer before
because Then is turning
to accommodate Now
with small movements like
the fluttering of birds' wings
& every night the world
ends
the way scientists warned us it would;
what is it about
summer
that is so evanescent?
each summer
the last summer.

//

a summer calm laid its soothing hand over everything, like death. -sylvia plath

//

6/7/07
there is daylight
on the water
there are remnants here
of gods
who have gone
before

today is wednesday

6/6/07
"goodbye" she said
falling back into herself;
i watched her fade away
like i dream i would forget
upon
waking

//

1/16/07
i dreamed of you and me
not climbing
but settling in the belly of
a mountain
settling for years of rest; hibernation
like bears
but we, the two of us
are not fierce as bears
though we would like to be
and pretend to be
we are not truly brave
you and i have no bravery
we are too kind
despite what we like to believe
we will always be too kind

//

8/27/06
her hands
are workers hands
hands that have produced
art
have held many
a crying face
to soothe the
trembling of a lip
and kiss crying eyes
hands that have
held other hands
have stroked skin have
pointed to other hands
and waved in greeting
have produced art:
sculpted faces
in clay, chiseled
and brought bodies from stone
eyes blank like the statues
in athens
her hands are mother's hands
are farmer's hands
plunged deep in the garden
returning to the earth
what she has taken, rows
of vegetables and flowers
her hands are sturdy hands
wrists turn to palms
turn to fingers
more stout than they were
but not so they are
no longer beautiful
her hands are rough hands
are red
are calloused for they
have learned a day's work
are chapped from wind
and wrinkled
and weathered by time
as time time changes all things
the ocean changes the sand
rushing until nothing is left
but the memory of a beach;
a photograph in
her hands