Alphabet City

The birds, all types, begin

To sing together, but you must 
listen closely, slow 
to assemble, 

deliberate
polyrhythmic, 

complex
as Indian classical music 
only very largo

such is life

The air and the wind 
finger cymbals
and gods aroma 
is the urge to dance
upon sunlight 

isn’t the day then complete?

so simple to love 
was all after all

cc: CC ‘23

Where worms
sleep in
early birds
catch nothing

cc: CC ‘23

After the rain, the world is scented
holy, the incense of benediction

a burnt bergamot
pulls your core to its edge
within you is the petrichor
that too is there without 

are you still there
yet there, even after the rain?

cc: CC ‘23

An old dog runs to a tree it can no longer scale

I turn from the bark, and for a moment, I’m a puppy again

cc: CC ‘23

And though I am old, 
and no longer spry like 10, 
I still collect the odd rocks
I find along the way

cc: CC ‘23

And she and I’d
while away hours, 
eating wild white rice 
with sweet-sour beets


(…who could ask for anything more?)
cc: CC ‘23

A goldfinch alights on my lemon tree
and I politely request a song, a lilt
if you will

she a silhouette on a branch
against dying sky

a throaty thrill,
a true trill from
the heart

I feed you
gladly

Still you fly

cc: CC '23

Never underestimate 
the loneliness of anyone 

cc: CC ‘23

What happened to the morning dove,
she who’d croon her trailing lilt 
too soon, too soon she would seem to say
in sun or daybreak’s mist,
her counterpoint in step
to the finch and the wren
both common as she in a world newly lit
such as then, such is now

cc: CC ‘23

Salt rims her eyes,
where tears had been.

Mascara runs on
jacquard cheeks; Pierrot.

Pale lips part:
shells, hollow,
pinholes,
twilight.

Luminous anemone,
fluorescent trails,
miles of blue in green.

God, her aroma
sweet, incense,
sweat, essence
hot on the exhale.

Nothing so soft
as the space between her eyes.

Ride her nose,
down dimples,
for lips.

Arabesques ’bout her lobes,
carve the neckline’s
long mortise.

Filigree atop her skin,
dampened, one continuous kiss,
without time nor need for air.

I yell for the world to “Clear!”
a time for fibrillation.
(I’m thinking maybe titillation?)

Or getting to the point:
distillation.

I lose myself in her,
double our hulk,
our girth.

For every front,
a back. For every figure,
a ground. For every pull on the string,
fluttering wings in the palm.

For every locked gaze
lays a walkway.

A john boat, a fair, the tunnel of love,
caramel, candy apples.

We coil together,
we roll and we tumble,
play-doh, rock, and sinew.

And in the end,
she’d prop up on elbows,

she’d say,
“You’re my favorite people.”

cc: CC '13, '23