The first thing she asks after inquiring about me, while gripping me in enveloping hug: how my wife is, the kids are we talk amiably, deeply about our lives, families. Stuff. I see in her eyes what I have since junior high; this she knows…

Half the class, the better half, take the unpaved path that leads to the top of the lake. Now shoeless, they flop out satchel stuff for inspection. Pencils, a putty pony, a tarp, a box of matches, an adult comic and six apples. Withheld gifts…

The wind in my face Cool dew in the air Nothing more fair Nothing more fair The sound of a gull So intense and so true Brings me back to you Brings my heart back to you A wonderful glow Time immemorial knows But every…

  Drifting   I listened to Leonard Cohen and Buffy St. Marie. They spoke to me in unity.   Philadelphia. 1971.   I was adrift like the Alaska Ferry I now see in what would be blue sea and sky now gray as if hope…

Not the station which doesn’t exist anymore, but the rails, a twinned bow draw across s violin strung with bone, the earth’s fingered sorrow felt as longing. A longing for what? You don’t know, but you’re sure someone is coming and something in the world is…

i see your words break you know what i want most now find me hold me help

A storm that almost came, false promises of wind and rain turns south, leaves the path set out To rend someone else I don’t dare ask for it, I won’t dare speak I don’t dare hunger, but I do, sight unseen I watch it I…

I heard you say, “God does not give us more than we can handle.”   But God did not give me this bruise, this scar this memory, this burden, this cage   These are not gifts from God.   Do not tell me to have…

Silence is golden only when spoken With our hands intertwined And your lips pressed against mine But you no longer speak And I no longer feel you breathe This calm you protrude has me at unease You are dark and mute as a grave Cold…

The road home is suddenly unfamiliar. Turning again, a fleeting moment of deja vu feels almost like hope. The mirror becomes opaque with time. Looking again, a fragment of translucent glass pierces the heart. The people we love grow distant. Trying again is like looking…