Category: poetry

• thinking of Baltimore

  some older ones about the city …

  The Man in Patterson Park

  Benson’s Market (Then and Now)

  Bass Player at the Horse You Came In On

  June 1, 2011

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• silk road (haiku)

  at 4 am it
  seems like a razor slices
  the narrowest vein.

  till ribbons of silk
  take to the road on camel
  leaving naught but dust.

  May 27, 2011

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• dreams like those

  with every sleeping breath
  a reaching sigh
  a thought a desire
  sends twisting sheets
  into knots.

  May 26, 2011

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• revisiting the past

  a few older poems….there is no common thread that i know of – just picked them out randomly. a reminder to scroll back through ones from last year!

  even memories fade

  la jolla nightclub

  north platte

  May 25, 2011

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• how they hang on

  all these loves like ghosts –
  how they hang on,
  with energy enough
  to throw plates
  yet the vision of which
  is leftover rain
  sneaking across the
  summer screens…

  May 23, 2011

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• train whistle in the rain

  From Alice B. Johnson’s “Where Children Live” (my great-grandmother’s book of poetry)

  Why must I sleep so lightly when the rain
  Beats dismally against my window pane,
  Through dark and endless hours of the night
  That fill themselves with loneliness and fright?
  Why must I lay awake and sometimes hear,
  Not only rain — but suddenly and clear,
  The whistle of a speeding troop-filled train?
  Such lonely sounds at night —
  Train whistle —
  Rain.

  May 20, 2011

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• south of the park (patterson, baltimore)

  we us and those like us
  we live south
  of the large green expanse
  of city lawn
  never venturing north
  staying away
  far away
  and shutting our doors locking them
  as soon as the sun
  dips down
  in case someone north
  gets anxious
  and wants more.

  May 18, 2011

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• untitled (big bang)

  if you were there you heard only static
  like
  a steady hum

  until the collisions happened
  and then
  things
  were born and
  things started accelerating out

  now all these things
  mean so little
  make no sound in the vacuum
  of space
  but they keep pushing
  outward.

  [author’s note – Blogger has been down the past several days! We’re back up and running now – thanks for your patience! I also had the special joy of seeing my little sister get married this weekend! It was beyond amazing! I’m so happy for Leanne and Gary!]

  May 16, 2011

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• to Robert Plant circa 1971

  it’s midnight – we are now
  twenty-three,
  if i lean just so out the window
  your hand will
  curve to the bare
  small of my back
  while the other will gently
  tap the steering wheel,
  all of this
  just as the California dusk
  takes a breathless gasp
  at the sight of
  night

  then when
  the smoke has cleared
  and tea has surrendered
  to breezes exploring their sheer
  surface we’ll be
  finding bare footing on
  the cold metal rungs
  of the fire escape
  with nothing –  nothing
  but to believe in
  our immortality and to fill
  blank seconds of
  night

  May 11, 2011

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• ah the comfort wall

  ah the comfort wall
  how years
  sweat into concrete bricks
  to carefully
  pile with mason skill,
  it is not enough
  for the stones to grow tall. they must
  reach side to side
  in an embrace
  soft breath of air
  seals each, kissed good
  and gone.

  May 7, 2011

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