I lay color down
to highlight not
necessarily to enunciate.
Like a kite o’er head
in early bedtime, sparklers
and spiraled streamers.
Asleep in slow moving
breezes under bundles of coats
and warm sweaters.
In arms that hold
endless days upon piers.
Sometimes the path
is batik.
© Chagall 2014
I am notably missing from the photo,
this portrait of me is instead now a landscape,
the foreground that should have been
a background had I actually arrived
on the scene. I wonder whose index finger
pressed down the shutter. Of all the proofs,
I like this one best, it instills a sense
of the imminent, careful lighting, edgy compose,
something’s about to happen, to jump at you from the frame,
you feel it.
Instead I order
a life-size print
of me in white hat
buried up to my forehead
blinded by the bank
of new-fallen snow.
© Chagall 2014
I seek a place of serenity always,
a place where the bubble rides
engaged and peaceful, natural
as breathing in; all is tuned
to perfect, as I’d prefer. You
need to slow all the way down, to
appreciate really the lack of angst,
zero – nay nada intrudes, invades the rest.
Who are you kidding?
she was incredulous.
Such a rocky road she disturbs.
© Chagall 2014
The rain in its patter
sounds to be trying
to drum home a point
already made, such moribund
yammer
hey – you got that?
wafts in sweet cologne, some rosy
cheap knock-off more cloying
than haunt brings an ache
to my head, eclipses the migraine
I once had in Nam, when those stars turned mist
to shroud good men of both sides
I would light ’em if I had ’em, feel the need
for strong smoke, held breath in incantation
awaiting release, new days will come
a roman candle erupts in my mind, I see
shiny things to fixate upon, come and go
divert my attention from checks marked Void
though the paper on which they print
is precisely the price I pay
© Chagall 2014
Paris underground, got to get above
to breathe in colored light and rain,
somewhere the girl with the doe’s eyes emits scents
when she’s warm again, but for now the metro is too hot.
The last drag on a night as it nears
dawn, I retain my poise even though I shuffle
and carry myself contemplative, in the rush of early stars,
late tears, departing planes, misted red tail lights.
I can see the flicker, a thousand cycles per second
impressions to strobe, so I dance and pulse intentionally
out of time in order to preserve the macabre, the long spindle
of my spine held erect in this samba, tendrils limber vines.
I bow best in tuxedo, she curtsies in gown, with spit-shine shoes
and perfect air waltzed down the stair rail, shined baluster
on which we glide so gingerly, how I embrace her at the landing
night lamps hushed low in the hall, the turn of some century somewhere.
The kiss is beyond confusion, tousled minds and souls
echo against the marble and ceramic, the air about our noses
warmed by friction of lips, my cheek incessantly tickled by her lashes,
such a brace at the race ‘long the length of the neckline.
I am lulled by the rattle of the trains on the rail,
forever between stations is such a long time so I ride
legs astride between two cars and enjoy the time
in and out of the tunnel, warmer outside, I wouldn’t have guessed.
I apply supple pressure subtly there at the small of her back
help her to find the updraft, the current to ride like the leaf on a scree
tossed, disassembled to light once again, after-starbirth
prepartum blues ere the birth of her new world.
She becomes the moment, blends polymorphic
her biology transmutes to be the time I experience, upon which I cast
my living sine wave, transgress as a pulse I impose on her
downbeat, very much like knotty riffs of rock ‘n roll.
In my dreams I’m often running until I go lucid
where I remember I’m flying of late
with a body like hers in my arms, so heady and weightless
albeit I fly pretty low, blessed just to be near the neckline.
© Chagall 2014
From the half-clam band-shell stage in the park I hear
the Avenue B bus release her air brakes on the avenue a few blocks over
Lovers in reels with palms pressed to backs
do solid square turns on strong legs
Dumbstruck in full moon
they reflect more in puddles than street lamps
Just an echo
a chime in the hollow
From the first floor flat in autumn windows
the people below look so real
I am soothed by the glow of our neighbor’s light
a beacon beyond past the dark
My mom would wave to planes both welcome
and farewell like strobes and Doppler I could never be certain
© Chagall 2014
The music played, came into open windows
and passing autos, on air it rode
to be lilted to far away places.
Strident and European piano, Schumann maybe
an opus from Carnaval, sounding almost like ragtime,
sketched the scene perfectly, as if scored specifically
to suit the moment it’s heard.
I feel curved in aural, ears and hollows,
it tickles the melody, leaves behind
the sweet scent of talc in the slow dust.
Lips were redder, the pinks possibly
more soft than today. Upon windblown linens,
did people bite harder then? Though her back always
arced that way.
© Chagall 2014
They were the first people
to leave the first child
on the moon.
© Chagall 2014
In awe to be born,
sans words, symbols
not needed, a world
of touch and hope
till touch no more.
© Chagall 2014
I eat teaspoons of cherry jelly,
reminds me of you.
© Chagall 2014
Alphabet City 