POETRY

“Poetry is language at its most distilled and most powerful.”
—Rita Dove
Time Travel

I count my homes—
those of my scattered youth
the sanctuary of our young family
the intermittent rest stops
of apartments and vacations.

[Zoetrope with Particulates in it and a Newborn]

and then her eyes fully opened — blazed through with strands of mud

Tea

my father holds
his favorite drink

Babylon

If America is Babylon / and you are an exile / newly arrived among pagans / Catholic, ‘Ngolan, Black, woman / you already know how to pray

Letter To a Young Poet

Do not say anything anybody else has said ever. Things are not “bleached by sun.”

Dear Deer in the Compost Pile

I tap at the alphabet while a single deer
taps at the dirt beyond the brush
on the far side of the tree line.

beach
On Undressing a Color / On Undressing a Girl

I imagine that undressing a color, though, would be so much like peeling a memory away from the grey and the white matter of your brain.

Soft Porn and Cuban Pine

It recommended
soft porn, as gentle prodding and petting parent
to parent might calm and soothe the kid.

Aging Punks

Every so often, they add a tattoo
in honor of some long-forgotten love.

The Kotel in Jerusalem is Filled with Cracks

We found in his suitcase T-shirts, his siddur, gifts he bought for his grandchildren…

Willpower

Live the rest of your life
from one worst case to another.

Like dirt

this is what I want you to to see:
leaves falling because it is too late for them not to

Clueless & Briefly Gorgeous

I buy too much, for someone of my stature.
could pawn a skinny metaphor to purchase a plump skin.
its reputed in our lineage— to daydream a life that shreds our pockets.

The State School 1984 His Given Name Was Wilbur  We Called Him Magpie

Mostly he ate what was put on his plate
snuck coffee grounds or dirt for a snack
Once a zipper Unzipped

There is an alternative universe

Ghosts for hire, whispers in her mouth,
cysts to feel, the symmetry of a gift.

Going Broke

Winter sat like a wolf
on the horizon.

Despairathon

You’ve spent a lifetime training
for this.

Vase

The storm passes without snow.
The car waits loyally in the back lot.

The Man

the man is stayed bent over the canvas
of my sofa. the man is me the man is him
self and I bring down the whip…