A Winter Morning In the Central Valley

                

                                                                                        

When dawn’s light flickers early in the morning           

And stars disappear in the lion’s long beard,              

Miracles take place. The birds’ jarring twitter

Is frittered away on the backs of dust motes,

And farmers invoke thanks with their votive

Inner voices. Corn stalks coated with frost;

Rolling stock herding steers for slaughter,

And one’s fine-tuned ear captures the poem

Upon which existence is insistently reliant.

 

 

 

 

Snake Eyes

 

I stare, I stare, I stare,

see shooting stars everywhere.

 

The astoundingly

ominous glare

that jets through coastal fog

dandy for late-winter

blossoms, spring

teetering, my eyes

asizzle

inside.

 

 

 

 

Whither Winter         

 

The old man on a park bench

in the dark, next to the statue

of Columbus, flossing

smoke-stained teeth

with a matchbook cover…

 

The lover dumped

by vice and false victory,

squashed down a manhole

to slip and stew…

 

The viceroy of pomp

and chance thanks

plucky stars as

his name comes up spades…

 

The avatar out of bounds

crosses the crooked line

of cause, has nothing to show…

 

The odd bird on the pier

pecking randomly at pebbles

not goose nor gander…

 

The woman whose womb held

the child born into grace

spares the world…

 

 

 

 

Saving Grace

 

1. Incubated

 

I never intended to draw a crowd.

I didn’t expect it to come to that.

Recognition just snuck up on me.

 

I’d rather have been left alone

to go backpacking anonymously

through towering giant Sequoias,

or maybe wheeling a unicycle

round and round Times Square

sporting coon skin cap and spurs.

 

Or even better to have my

adorable melancholy baby

come and sit in my lap, arms

wound tightly around her waist

as I whistle intimate lullabies

that make her all misty-eyed

and shoo those pesky gawkers

out of time’s crumbly temple.

 

2. Rapture Rupture

 

Really it was nothing more than a dalliance,

the romance between Seymour and Sally.

Sally wouldn’t slow dance, and Seymour

was both left feet at the two-step.

Margaritas only made their efforts less

fruitful. Had only they been grateful

the outcome wouldn’t have been so sad.

 

3. Apostolic

 

The axis of evil is a tricky sinkhole,

it shifts wherever I turn. Curtain shut

it blocks out dawn. Open to noon sun

it allows ghosts liberated from hell

the oxygen they require to breed.

 

The terrorist fears not dissolution

of the flesh. He must remove shackles

of those ignominious ghosts or perish.

 

4. Libertine

 

The country that goes to war

against itself

is in for a pit of misery

from the outset…

 

Israelite vs. Palestinian,

black vs. white,

innate opposition

to the foreign nation

each other is…

 

Brother misapprehending

blood brother—

vendetta pandemic

amongst separate creeds…

 

Those unnatural factoids

android-like painting

skies fantastic colors

no-one shall discover…

 

5. Mini Me

 

As if nobody ever heard of heart…

 

I suppose I’m in the middle

of a naked garden, fountains galore,

sanding down days with gravity,

yanked, spanked, spinning ripple

that clings to a lion’s nipple.

 

Frying eggs at the cozy villa with

gingerbread trim and mossy shingles

expunges inertia instigated in alleys

occupied by mazes of immigrants.

 

The flowing river rends me.

I’m bent like a pretzel, yet capable

of hunting salamanders with a spear.

 

 

 

 

Descant du Jour                                            

                                                                                           

               Great God! I’d rather be a Pagan                  

                                    --Wordsworth

 

I’d rather be sipping absinthe in Paris

On Rue Montmartre with a Cuban cigar,

Flicking the universe from my index finger

Into erstwhile unknown mystery zones

Than vying for a parking spot at WalMart,

Scratching my head while following stocks,

Rooting for someone on American Idol,

Chanting in a cold shower, tobogganing

Or aiming my Coolpix at the Roman Colosseum.

 

The tightwire narrows daily, no net

Below, not even a floor should I fall.

Conversely, no walls to lock me in,

Though the load on my back swells.