She always comes and goes
Late at night, then early morning
Stays the shortest time she needs
A gasp, a sharp intake of breath
She holds, though I’ve never heard her release
© Chagall 2013
Tag Archive: love lost
Life blows gently and steady
to winnow you from my soul.
© Chagall 2013
In February
at Mardi Gras
we ride top-down
we sport our ware
we reflect in moonlight there
where the earth splits
where we drop
off the horizon
At the water’s edge
I’ll confess
I’ll tell her
I’m a snowfall
in Harlem
in streetlamp
to twirl
to the ground
In freefall
I tumble
wildly
like a pollynose
shed from trees
lit in long slants
of sun ray
cold and oblique
to the ground
Enough to tease
but surely not
enough to grow
one gets impatient
to wait for spring
to roll through
time on a promise
wishful to think
more than passion
Some nights
in definite
bold relief
stark engravings
where the lean sight
of you cascades
over me
in ribbons
of perfumed hair
Too fleet
so many things
come and go
too quickly
so much time
stirs yet so
little ado
© Chagall 2013
A bridge with your name
Where slow cabs drive lovers home
Early dawn next day
© Chagall 2013
The light’s as important
as the words
can make it all
timeless
outside
every pulse
forever
in an instant
the very first
and only kisses
spliced all
together
lost
on a reel.
© Chagall 2013
There are places to go
but we don’t go
and so
we wonder
better air there
but we really don’t
care
inhale
and pray
we and the eagle
make three
still the sea’s
too wide
for everyday travel
There are places to go
but we really don’t go
So that’s why
we wonder
© Chagall 2013
Just like the girl on the tapes I order un carafe d’eau
hoping it will solve for thirst I have
If I smoked I’d light one now
strike it nonchalant
With just a touch
of distant stare
to show the wheels
still turn
Circumspect to be
less than
ordinary
I have somewhere to be
so I say I must be going now
Je dois partir maintenant
To you lovers
at your tables
I nod to you
in silent unknowing
Your gaze on my back
falls for far too short
a moment
© Chagall 2013
I am.
She is.
We are.
They part.
© Chagall 2013
If we all,
tout le monde,
share one,
simply a moment
to rejoice
in freedom
that depends
on no one
or thing
other
than its own
desire to be,
it’s its own will.
I yearn,
so I crave,
I stretch in earnest
into only
hopeful things,
the art
of our possibilities,
the lyric wit
of our songs
our collective wit,
our prayerful songs.
And I love you best
perhaps by not knowing you
at all.
. . .
And you and I
will dive
from high towers . . .
© Chagall 2013
A woman
of no and every
color
waves to me
from the rooftop
before
she flies away.
I watch as her bubble
ascends . . .
the chevron
the V of pigeons
entangled in lines
alley music
heaven’s door framed
in mosaics.
© Chagall 2013
Alphabet City 