Tango

He knows
how family is a war zone,
strut meets
counterstrut.

Leaving and not
leaving soon enough,
the soft and warm
up for grabs.

He knows how life is war,
how sweet is victory
and how permanent and
devastating is defeat.

Love is the prize
and always has been.
Those outcast can only
squeeze tight to
hold themselves in.

Memories of Winnipeg

We often
intensly disagree,
but I know your face
and over the long term
you have always been here
and tightening my strings.
.
Now I see you broken.
You have
temporarily lost and
every one of your days is scary
as you hang on a string above the
safety web, with king safety poised to
eat you.
.
I could gloat and will and do in private
while smiling down at you and offering
a hand which I know is not enough.
We have tightened each other's
knots and tugged for 20 years. I'm
glad to see you victim of your errors.
.
I tell you your career has been
checkered. You have been stubborn and
righteous as if you were
meant to struggle. My
poor friend. And you have become
something else. It must be
better now.

Time Factory

The human brain
has an organelle
.
that stacks heartbeats
end to end
and synthesizes time.
.
We are conscious
because we
make moments.

My Van Gogh Poem

　

Oh look at that Europe.
I love the way it moves
the fields dance and
the stars circle each other
in the sky. I want a place of my own.

Thank God for my eyes
and for the color. When
I cry and my eyes
emit paint. I make
my own Europe.
Please take it.

The Odd Thing About Memory

I remember Mr. Quinn.
"You can't just keep running
roughshod over people's feelings."
He told me when I was twenty.
.
It's odd
that I remember the
bumpy spots in the path
and honor those names.
.
The broken spots
have anchors in my dreams.
They shame me all my life.
I will be embarrassed beyond death.

How Poorly Do I Love You?

We have
the agreed engagement of
fingers and the casual
brace of arm on waist and
laughter to break the silence.
We sleep with limb touching limb
and feel the brief vacuum of absence.
.
I tell her that she
spent most of her life
orbiting around people
who never learned how
to show love.
.
I ask,
among the
love skills deficient,
why am I different?

Heroism Dream

They have forgotten the athletes.
Heroically, I run to grab
as much of the vaccine as I can find.
I dash through the tunnel
to where they are about to board the bus.

But I must return to make an appearence
at the dinner party
and I forget the needles.
You watch my sneaking back.

I can't do it all myself. I cry out,
in spite of my heroic intentions.
I lose the way as my opportunities vanish
Something is wrong with my legs.

When all comes
down to it, poems
flow through my
brain like dreams,
ephemeral whisps
of egocentricity processed
through my eyes,
frozen self-centered ripples.