Never enough time

Never enough time to be a mother
Never enough time to be a father
Never enough time for a child
Who grows out of itself by tomorrow

The child will be gone
Replaced by a woman
Replaced by a man
Replaced by a stranger 
Come tomorrow

Never enough time to be wife
Never enough to be husband
To be lover 
To be child
To be constant
Come tomorrow

Come tomorrow
Come stranger

Who does not fear tomorrow?

life as lived

Posted a photo of the wild ones in the water--the loved dogs
in their eternal summer. The photo is all 
bright and light and shore and water
and too easy laughter,
it does not tell all.

after the party is better

After the party is better
at night when only empty glasses
remain crowding together
on tables being cleared

There, a few careless stains 
on tablecloths for what spilled
and broke of so much cheer

The band is done
all dancing, too, as guests 
gone
memory of a good night:

waiters making sounds
stacking plates etc. minutes.
They too, very soon gone.

How much conversation
is left, is to go on--is how much 
night we have left.

I think I will prefer now
after a brunch party

Still sunny, we still
can have rest of the day 
together yet. 
                  

                                     photo by A. Schneidt

shall we take a quiet walk together?

Love Like Salt

Love Like Salt



It lies in our hands in crystals
too intricate to decipher

It goes into the skillet
without being given a second thought

It spills on the floor so fine
we step all over it

We carry a pinch behind each eyeball

It breaks out on our foreheads

We store it inside our bodies
in secret wineskins

At supper, we pass it around the table
talking of holidays and the sea. 

by Lisel Mueller 

ride along with the universe

The entire day with rain. I remembered my colleague yesterday saying love the rain;
so I sent a video Singing in the Rain and remembered too late it is about love; and
didn't the colleague tell me in a question the wife was having an affair? The entire

day with rain. News in a long list came in, drenched, through the front door. A list of
too many unnamed: dead children washed ashore, refugees, the world a square.
S sent an email from Singapore, saying his non-fiction on Philippine boxers is done

also, how is my writing. Should I say the manuscript is done and now I hear nothing.
On its stead, I spend an entire day with rain solving math equations imaginary
problems with clear solutions--how about children caught in war and un-leaving?

There is a Simic upstairs: a child running with scissors. 
A new piece I need to write for a public reading for teenagers on the 13th. 
A party faring a dear friend well into retirement. 
The book review of a first compendium of local literature long overdue. 
A module to leave for when I leave. 
And places here I have yet to be in.
A yearlong farewell; till home again...

...sometimes I dream of empty. That sound of water, that wind, that sky... 

but until then, not yet, not yet