the day after the party,
when everyone is gone,
I try to hear the voices
left behind trapped in the wood,
pretend to see graceful forms
yet move about the grass
the breeze is cooler,
the sun more wane
will yesterday
ever come again?
odd how aroma lingers
while sights and sounds
and the touch of hands
disappear
I inhale deeply to savor
this real relic of what was,
and decide to forego exhalation
Chagall 2020
small chickadee on the very corner of my roof,
where east and west meet north and south,
head thrown back, full throated with song,
in the downpour of a sun-shower
Carlos 2020
art about the making of art
is not as compelling as art
as art is
yet life about life
is love
Chagall 2020
I know it’s trite to ponder
is it real or a dream,
a well-worn writer’s device,
this question of whether or not
the loss of self so profound
that one has to wonder and
wander about, the stuff on which
it is founded and grounded
wisps abound,
images fleet, hinting,
leave me melancholy,
wanting
so many symbols
so real
I never agreed to
be a part of any
equation
please let me live
in my favorite space
with my daily routine,
my mundane happiness,
these trivial concerns
of mine, my easily
begotten
joy
allow me to be
simply small
irrelevant
to anyone
but a few
and most of all
grant the children,
the babies born today,
peace in their time
Chagall 2020
sight no longer comes effortlessly
I can feel my eyes, the effort they make to draw
in the light, to sketch the world about me
like liquid through a straw
the photons pulse my optic nerve
purple – this way!
orange – over here…
upside down I turn myself
correct side up
happier
inverted
happier
ceiling moldings are curbs
and chandeliers are art-deco tables
we sit around, seated on ceiling tiles
above us only carpet,
empty shoes
that defy
gravity
stepping from window ledges
we float airily up
to our deaths
vision saturates my brain
like a sponge drinks water
I am all things sensuous
and sensual
I see
therefore I am
Chagall 2020
It transcends profession, race, gender, and nation
A most profound heartbreak
concerning another being
Crime against sentience, existence,
tender life
Chagall 2020
I am torn between two topics today,
how to encase the eternity of morning, or a diatribe
on those who would dance on yesterday’s ashes and broken glass
But perhaps they are one and the same,
a duality of wonder and hate,
the absence of the other
in the other
the promise of life
the negation of promise
celebration that there is mourning
disconsolation over inhumanity
the blurring of the outline of being
human
Me? I still breathe in the sun, the early breeze,
and cry over birdsong that lilts from the trees,
I rejoice in the infinite shades of greens
that God has bestowed on my eyes,
the blues on my ears,
salt on my tongue,
warmth upon skin
…and I will lie down in heady fields of lavender
when I die, my face to the sky, tickled orange by tiny ladybugs,
rather than be consumed by flame
Chagall 2020
The sun died today
In the throes of final light
Sky turns so lovely
Chagall 2020
at least once a day, I lie on my back,
to watch the sun in the sky
we are often both
lost behind clouds
at times like those I tolerate the darkening,
then consider how large – how long – is the offending cloud,
the direction and speed of the wind, to estimate the return of the light
the sun always eventually returns,
except one time there was this cloud
that came and was going according to plan
and once it had went, had taken with it the sun
as if in passing it had dabbed its backside with our star,
made it stick, and continued with it hidden in tow,
such a fluffy magician
but of course this was just an illusion,
a result perhaps of sleep interceding,
some lapse of time that moved the sun
from here to there, the loss of my mind
for a moment, maybe a different cloud
or a different sky
and I thought would a cloud like this
have a silver lining, as I’ve heard it said
all clouds do
I pondered this for what seemed to be ages,
finally deciding
when our sun, our local star,
is down to its final moments of burn, spitting
hydrogen, helium, oxygen, and neon, after billions
of years, in that last eight minutes of light, before
the collapse – the eternal shift – of the Milky Way…
I would beckon this cloud to reappear to release
the beautiful sun stolen that day
Chagall 2020
There are stories I have not written,
paths I’ve not walked, nor trampled,
bramble I have yet to tangle with
Outside
there is peace in the dust
Footprints in the lie of my heart,
narrow heel and textured sole, your well-worn moccasins
left to dry upon sun-warmed wood
I have rarely seen yellow so blue
The absence of you,
the anticipation of someday
There are words to you I have not spoken,
ideas I have not explored, nor endured,
webs I’ve not woven
My mind is a round I sing,
a duet I perform, a half-verse behind
with you a step ahead, a whole-tone higher
And I am a stray astray,
bled in thick bramble
Chagall 2020
