Tag Archive: life


Sara of Beautiful Rain

Small letters alight on her lashes, tiny poetry about her eyes
Kisses of ancient rhythm, a pucker for a flame stoked
Each blink the turn of a page reveals whole worlds
Every breath has meaning, those lighter than air defy gravity
Limericks line her brow when she laughs
When she sighs I trace my lips along the long volta of her neckline
Where her sonnets turn around
Down her arms flow three-letter words, we are kids again
Awash in primary colors, hands waving wildly at tickles
Dancing about in a spray, we drink water from a hose
There are symbols dangling from her ears that I do not recognize
Baubles of mystery; I linger there eschewing translation.

© Chagall 2016

 

Almost Went Untitled

On a carpet of flower petals
I lie eyeing the sun. Tap
those receptors there,
prod me to yearn for forever
or another vast place where I sense
my being is once removed.

My sunlit face not a fleeting echo.

Her smile across the handlebars
with my heart there in the basket.

I watch her pedal away. Somewhere
there are sambas playing.

© Chagall 2016

Prayer and Pledge: From an Aerie

Candles oblige me, light me back
to the sea, for at night I lose my way
if not for the sound of surf, the salt-spray,
I’d be lost, tossed about as innocence in the squall,
fragile bones amid limber wind, snapped barely alive
except for the thought of you buried deep,
the last seed of hope that I know I’ll sow someday.

© Chagall 2016

Aloha

I’m an ukulélé by an open window and
I’m hoping that you’ll pick me up to pluck
Sing a song about three lovers near the water
Lala lala lala la aloha-oe

© Chagall 2016

The Interim

The lights are going out,
not forever – just for now.

We have coffee and tea,
we can make bread if need be,
sing, play cards …

Only for a little while,
only just for now.

© Chagall 2016

A Dog Out the Window

If you – my student –
go forward to do great things,
come back for me, take me along for the ride.

© Chagall 2016

Turquoise Piping

What I thought was one of
the black butterflies of summer
was instead a tiny bird.

© Chagall 2016

October

Ripe things are
getting harder to find
nowadays.

© Chagall 2016

Appearances Aside

They’re pretty – perfect really, she says.
Buy the dead flowers.

But I’m more tempted
by the sentient ones
despite their powdery mildew.

© Chagall 2016

Ice Chips

The night is crisp, autumnal.
Bourbon sweeter.
My son and his petite amie
at a friend’s cabin while they’re away.
With them, a bag of sweet potatoes
I grew and cured, for roasting
over the wood fire they’ll make.

Life is good.
Peepers sing earlier
than usual tonight. Harmonics from breezes
to trees to shape the glass arc of our ears
to blow gently in them.
I am yellow aged orange inflamed
dared to go red before withering.

I pray to the last gold ray of sun
there in the tall eastern trees
that refuses to say die to another day.

© Chagall 2016