Alphabet City

old and tired, her body arrayed with wires,
tubes in her arms with greater girth than her own wrists,
she turns to me and asks
What is a bucket list?

Chagall 2020

O’ would you like to swing on a star,
dangle from a comma?

Grab a handle and dance

Chagall 2020

Her dreams, like kites strung from her heart,
never take flight so she has severed their strings

From her roof, so near the edge,
kites on the horizon appear
half-way already to heaven

Chagall 2020

the involved mind is reams bound, perceptions woven,
crosshatched, all that we are

the assembly of tidy bundles,
of things that need to be

I open a window to let the strong breeze blow and scatter it all about,
oh, god how delicious the salt on the air, the wet primeval scent…

“…wane light, timeless light, faded surf on sand
foams slower tonight than when we used to stroll…”

all motion, sound, the heart…
simply stop

let us vow to continue to roam
in the face of this newfound vantage

Chagall 2020

It is better to make some money and regret not having made more,
than to lose and regret not having made any at all

Chagall 2020

Fully follow through on positions you’ve abandoned
to understand where you might have wound up

Chagall 2020

she dances to Take 5
in 4/4 time while I spin
her hour glass

Brubeck glances
furtively up from the keys

black and white
like the cookies
not the people

in the high registers I find my night chills
solemn intervals, visceral melodies, the highball
glass forever a-tinkle
with ice

crunching down on
ice

gnawing, hoping
pining, swaying

watch her bounce a bit
her bottom bulbous

left hand stroll through the bass – or a standup slap-thumb
to drive a beat, walk the chromatic path up a thigh,
down a lane, to and fro, and Dave just keeps groovin’
in and out 5/4

Chagall 2020

I left there then
thinking life here
was passing me by,
and now it does, and
so it has

Chagall 2020

I wish I had loved you
and been loved by you
more

Chagall 2020

never pass on a pancake
mop up some syrup and put it in your pocket
snack on it later in the day
perhaps after vespers

Chagall 2020