February Day, Boston
Half past eight. I wake in silence to sun on the calla lily, a single beam assaulting he white swirled cup. Yesterday snow skimmed past the windows on horizontal waves, drifts piling up on the front steps under the high wind. I shoveled snow that fell for three days. February air scrapes under the peeling windowsill. Bleached light skids across the length of the room into each corner on this timid morning before the sun rushes away. This afternoon the narcissus bulbs I planted earlier in clay pots are splitting open, forced out into...
Read MoreLavender
A gentleness in the lavender of touch, Soft against another, sheets Organically cool blue with a touch of cloud. One day Cupid wakes to find his arrows stolen Enters earth on footed wings. Angry and puzzled, he finds them In a park near a grove scattered and dull, One shaft broken. In the trees he hears joy, Good wine, beauty, a whisper of lips. How trite. One lover fingering the palm of another, A message so secret everyone knows its depth. Touch comes in color, it’s that easy. Cupid leaves with everything he has lost Bits of his anger clinging to the grass Flowering into large bosoms of...
Read MoreMy Wife Peeling an Apple
She takes the apple in her palm and presses the paring knife under the flesh just below the stem. As if it required no thought, as if it were natural as falling asleep, she spins the apple slowly with one hand, and pulls the blade toward her other thumb. It’s like watching an ice dancer, or a gymnast on a balance beam — you’re sure that every next move will slice jaggedly into her, and fall to the floor in a clatter, blood dripping to pool at her toes. But she doesn’t break eye contact, not even a pause in the conversation; red skin, pulled from white flesh, hanging...
Read MoreAnniversary
Remember how I used to scrape off irritating little bumps as if perfect attainment of a suppler, less eventful shape, a peace at the expense of love, and armchair grace, had quite become a sort of holy grail? The day I finally attained the perfect peace I’d sought, I heard a voice from somewhere that explained the living’s really in the lumps. I was struck dumb but thought the thought...
Read MoreThe Second to the Last Time
when the moon was full and I wore my navy silk pants / and my car got stuck in your driveway and I read poems on your rug naked / the space heater warming my ass / and you said I was a cat in another life and I laughed because I knew I was really a dog / willing to be kicked and come back for more / and after the sex and the sounds we walked the mountain roads / snow and silence / it’s easy to feel alone when you’re holding someone’s hand / we walked fast because our legs were cold / and I remembered a movie scene of a woman leaning over a railing to wave goodbye to her lover / I...
Read MoreA Character from Proust
He finds that Habit holds too close and holds too tight. “Let go,” He thinks, “I have my breath to catch. What started as a waltz Is now this marathon. I fold within your tireless arms. You were attractive at first. We seemed to fit. Now I cannot recall Your absence. Whatever tawdry witch has cast her spell, I implore To raise her wand. I am too weak now Panic nears. Am I never to guide and be guided by Joy, that radiant other Whose classic head, unknowing of my plight, Rounds into mocking view too often to be chance?” Now he believes that from the start He should have partnered The...
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