Chainsaw on Cherry Wood

I find nothing beautiful
In the shredding sound
Of chainsaw on cherry wood.
Why do machines always seem
Angry?

By the end of the day
Another hole has opened in the sky.
No shelter -
No shelter -
No shelter from the blistering sun
Of this new age.

Even to trees death must come.

Are these the things
  that help old women
    lay down their arms and say
     
Good night?

On the Eve of Beginnings and Endings

Pause
Pause on the edge
Pause on the edge and look

Look
Look below
Look below to the valleys
Valleys and vistas
Valleys and vistas and winding rivers
Rivers that teem
Teem with the life of a thousand suns
A thousand suns and a thousand worlds
     and the moon as a compass

Now look up
Up to the heavens
The heavens that teem
Teem with the light of endless stars
Stars and clouds and the colors of space

Where numbers are meaningless
Only the infinite counts

Now pause
Pause and breathe
Breathe the valleys and vistas
Breathe the teeming rivers the thousand stars the cream of clouds

Carry the world in your heart
Carry the skies in your lungs

Now step into space

madness

we tell the same stories
over and
    over and
      over and
        over and
          under and
       under and
onto the rocks shores wells
deep
            as caverns
deep
           as devils
deep
           as canyons and conches and caterwauls
   and waterfalls
cascading lines of doggerrel can only go
so
far
the day we fell we fell
down
    from the summit
down 
   from the heavens
blue sky all why and wherefore
and intellect so circumspect
into
the pit
of mud
what worth can anyone make
of mud
but mud
and clay
  and homes
    and dreams
      and figurines
figurines that speak
                       like gods
and hear
                      like gods
silent and deaf
prayer after
    prayer after
         prayer
crashing like cataracts off boulders
over and
   over and
      over and
        over and
           over and
   under again
we pray the same prayers sing
the same hymns want
the same wants and fears and no one nears and
no one hears
over and
     over years
         upon years
            upon
hard clay ears

god is a desert all dried up

We Are

We are
too dense to breathe
too soft to kill
too cold to die

We are
made of silk
spun sweet as amber
whistling wisps of jade wind
a cacaphony of birds and wolves

We are
close-hewn and rough-cut
beetles and ramikins
shorn sheep and tulip blossoms
all afloat on crackling seas

We will not be silenced

Not 'til bleeding wood
finds its way on force-fed feet
to the crooked ends of the earth

We will follow our fear
and eat it raw.

We are we are we are
We.

Elegy June 2016

The crow's hoarse shofar drowns
the dancing trill of songbirds.
"Death. Death. Death," it warns
by the muted glow
of a cloud-cast dawn.

There is a special providence in
the fall of a sparrow
the uplifted ends of green leaves
a blush of rainbow
a whirling storm of apple blossoms.

One, two, ten, fifty -
fifty souls fall to earth
and rise again
crying "Kyrie Elaison!"

Where do flowers go
when they die?

Ashes to ashes,
dust to dust.
"The Lord be with you."
And also with you.

inviting the sun

it’s been less than a day
since i invited the sun into my home

there’s a fullness
to my mansion
now that she’s here
time is tighter
louder
i want to feel her presence forever
   
in a year I will hear her
running from the lions in the basement
clear and confident
dancing below her long arms
and flying
feet-last
across the sky

in the morning
she will stand by a swing set
laughing under an erect sycamore
her hands full of vanilla and garlic

in the evening
she will sit on a far-off subway train
different from any other thief
stealing a remembered invention

she will drop her feet
frown skeptically
and curl her slim toes

i will curl away from her

Word Hoard

I cling to words,
   collect them, pile them,
     scrounge them from the rubbish.
I cannot let them go -
  yours, mine, the world's -
Every one born of a perilous, toil-filled journey
  along spark-ignited neurons
    through the larynx off the tongue into air,
     through the sinews touching fingers tapping keys
       falling into the black hole of the machine and 
Coming out the other side to rest on the page.

Earthlings, our world overflows with words!
  We cringe as we craft them, battling to build,
     struggling to sculpt, stringing syllables like beads.
We feed one another on their milk.
   We weave them into strong ropes to rescue
      or to hang.

How can I bear to throw away a single one unread?