Telling Time

Let me blunder through another day
mourning the tinny honey of my words.

"I'm fine. I really am fine."

God, or something of that spirit, sits with me and pats my hand
when I say what I have learned.

Fine sadness, is delicate porcelain between my fingers,
steaming with hot tea and not enough to say.

"He would have been 21 today."

The warbler has taken the attention of the funeral director
as he tells me the story of his son.
I am patient in the loutish silence we share.
It is not a lofty place where we shine without fault.

We wallow in the opulent ashes
and the smell of the last breath,
all witnesses of something we'd forgotten.


This is part of the deal we make
to be in human time.

Twenty One

At dusk in the garden
I listened for you
and your gentle cry
chirping with the wax wings,

in the whispers of a warrior hummingbird
coming close to the bee balm
as if to call my bluff

as if I had a vision
twenty one years after
the vapor of this short life.

The ghost of you is here
in the flowers and in two candles,

for birth
for death.

The darkness is lit
by northern lights
and a sliver,
the silver moon.

Nearing Sleep

Just before midnight
pass me the password in a kiss
knowing that oxygen helps us to banter
over the din of anger and hurt.

Deliver the digits
in a whisper
between your teeth,
like a savior
waiting for God
grovelling like a fish
out of water.

My obscene laughter
is naked and forms blasphemy
in my throat.

Just before midnight
the moths make their way through
the July crack in the screens.

Send them all back to the fire.
The flame is where we all deserve to burn.

Ordinary Time

This pristine day
blunders along
unaware of the brilliant luster
more ordinary than most.

In this time where melancholy is my neighbor
I cannot ask to borrow any sweetness
for there is no paying back
this set of honest hours.

I am stupified by how crowded love can be in summer
and how fast the sun moves across the skies
and the darkness of the other side of the moons.

Put your hand gently
at the curve of my low back
if you dare
and take my hand
so that you might guide me
into the steps
of another dance
where we are
belly to belly
looking into the eyes we know
reflect the unconditional truth.

My mind is askew in these unfamiliar moves,
but my heart knows the way
like the cows
to the smell of golden fresh straw
and the quiet of the barn
at deep dusk of fireflies
in July.

Tender

Perhaps it is the strength of my Norwegian bones
that unleashes the tremors
when green is overfilling the places
between leaves with more green.

The allure of the longest day
thunders in my head
like a voracious hunger
that only light can satisfy.

My body aches with the echos
of a mournful, empty sob
of relief after months
of so much blinding white.

I sweep my arm along my face,
over my ears at the buzzing and bites
that begin to itch.
My hands useless
covered with dirt
that was found
where pumpkins
and sunflowers
will germinate.

The tender roots
rivulets of life
in the warm soil.

Here I watch the ghosts
of my love flow past me
chanting an ancient familiar song.

Death is a false door
to this Valhalla.

The Day You Were Born

On the day you were born
nothing ordinary happened.

Even while the moon
turned to golden blood

and the horizon
was only a flimsy diversion
to all the pain of every birth,

I pleaded with the heavens
to release me from the grip
love held on my tired womb.

The residue of God
could not be washed away
even in the dark waters
of knowing everything
would eventually end.

This ticking clock of my body
sounded and the bells rang out
to announce your arrival
on a path we have all walked.

We didn't know it then,
but it was the birds who knew your name
before you arrived with the feathers of angels
imprinted on your feet.

It was the birds who sang loudest of all
pointing at the red heart fluttering in your chest
like it was the first day of spring
in the first garden every dreamed.

Drifting

The mind splinters again
thinking of all that I've done alone
and what is left undone.

I am swamped by the cluttered clouds
gathering in the west
and I lurch around in the churning waters
of an unknown overwhelming grief.

Here I am
scudding along before the storm
like a child trying to outrun the beast
in a bad dream.

I swash my morose mouth with soap
frowning while I wait
in another silent life preserver.