Tuesday, January 10, 2017

What more to ask for....




The heart trusts its beating
to do so, until done.

And there’s little, really,
we can do,

but trust too….it’s 
a heart thing. 
                             12-13-16


**


In the midst of this, to the east
and to the south across the bay, light 
forwards curtained mists
of rounded colors  

while distant freeway autos, strung 
below the hills, hum its edge 
like rippled currents 

of evening fire-flies.
                                 12-14


**


The old man in the story 
ignores the television 
in order to retain his dignity.

“The real news,” he says, 
“is the snow outside.” 

Real history is known locally
or not known at all.
                                 12-15


**


From Robert Lax:

“Don’t try to say something convincing, try
to say something true.”

*

“Penetrate, do not appraise.”


**


Stepping onto the deck into evening 
air—in every direction, single stars 
in their singular intention. 

Constellations are what others see.
Stars just be stars, as bright
as they can be.
                              12-17


**


The writer tells me
I am existence
conscious of itself,

therefore, every poem
is a self-portrait,
filtered, in this case,

through early morning mist.


**


Winter’s night sky beckons stars
even before itself arriving, 

and even then, as if suddenly there,
in all its resplendent blackness.
                                                   12-19


**


Names and shadows and dreams 
proliferate like the clover native peoples
here ate—names ring in sustained light,
shadows check the uncertain and dreams 
redeem and affirm, mistakes we’ve made, 
the victories we’ve shared.
                                                         12-20


**


If you’ve notice the moon, it heals itself,
broken to full, breaking then coming whole,

self-fulfilling promises of open-ended movement 
and the light emergent there.

This morning it sits high in wintered sky, 
at well less than half,

a bright star below its lowest tip, and below that 
and less bright, another: a stream, I thought at first, 

no, a trickle, but then 
again, no:

tear drops.
                                  12-22


**


I don’t know for certain if the clock
read quarter till four or five
when first spied from beneath
the blankets, but it’s till six now,
with coffee, with the throbbing foot
now raised with ice, with pen in hand
and you back to sleep—quarter till six
and an entire world at peace.
                                                             12-23


**


the peace-pen project:

bio-diverse ecosystems are numberless,
i vow to learn them all…
                                          12-25


**


Although encroaching glaucoma
gives cause for concern in oncoming
headlights, starlight remains
a safe haven, 

not to mention
the inner light, where neither is there
trouble there—adaptation is but one face 
of change, the unfinished, 

the tissue of existence
and trust a natural function.


**


On this morning’s walk, 
a thin-slivered moon cuts 
a horizon lost 

to the slow approach
of clumped and shadowed
trees—if not this, who am I ?

                                               12-27

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