Not to go gentle into the night

It cannot be trust, if it is not trust
Isn't it?
Not love, if not love

Things that can only be absolute are
Too large
For lives with threaded seams

Do weeds in a landscaped yard know
Their fate, just the same
They soak up sun and rain

Of course we know sweetness cannot 
Be had for long
But what is life for, if not for it?

the kitten under the rain

a boy was keeping a kitten
away from the corner of their yard

the kitten squeezed between potted plant
and garbage bin

soaked because it had been raining 
two days and the streets still wet

my dog tried to sniff the kitten
the kitten tried to defend itself

tiny claws tiny fangs all ferociousness
in a tiny life in a tiny body

i showed the boy how to hold 
the kitten by its ear

it will remember its mother
and stop being fierce

so the boy held the kitten
the way its mother did

the kitten remembered its mother
and trusted the boy

and the boy threw the kitten away

welfare of the world

Had I still been younger, I would have
still wanted to change the world.
Time has a way of showing a little
at a time, moment to moment 
letting me scale what can be done, 
what can't.

I write quiet poems now. Burning still,
I'd like to believe, in an almost imploding
kind of way; far from what I once had been:
immortal in being 

so much younger. wide eyed
out in the streets.

It has been years. 
And I have come to understand the way
the body, too, comes to understand:
how some stories are longer than we are.

Like violence.
Kindness.
Unconditional.

Some moments I wonder if a poem 
does make a difference in the world.
The kind that is enough to move a shadow.
Or are we deluding ourselves
believing we worth as much as a star.

It is possible
we don't. We are 
alive anyway.

Like every other little thing everyday:
leaf still on a twig, blade of grass,
weed, ant, housefly, guinea pig, 
farmed chicken, stray dog.

Who gets to say which life matters more.

Some stories, by their nature, are
truly longer than we are...
No one can really save the world and live 
to tell all the stories beginning to end.

early walk with dog

                                                for W


We still see the stars in the morning
because we get up before daybreak.
Sometimes we mistake it for night. 
My dog, what does he think
when he sits as I get our tie,
open the door and begin our walk 
no longer as long it used to be. 
We both are getting old.
He, more longanimous than I.

Metaphors of walking frighten me.
A long singular walk
at times with company
staying as long as they could.
In the end...

I realise this morning
how terribly frightened I am.
In spite of faith and knowledge
things have a way of turning
alright. Of course, 

the stars are there in the sky 
daybreak or night.

a clearing in the woods

Let me tell you a secret. This

          is my clearing in the woods

                       shared only by you.
          
                               Three years now.


I have grown a little too old for public 
announcements, the way younger ones have made 
out of the internet: a potted plant, a garden, 
a landscape, a directed trail to the woodshed 
by the lake right after the painted sign 
on reclaimed wood: Welcome Crowd 
tail as they hunt in search of themselves.

Consider the woods at the back of my house
through the screened door opened by keypad.
A password uttered in silent type.
The woods, metaphors of the real: the steel gate
needs fixing; the few garden herbs that survived
the yard onslaught of a playful young dog; 
list of things to do including translations

of poems for anthology, necessary visit
to the bank, call from the secretary, 
a last stretch of familiarity. I walk through
the woods throughout the day 

with some moments of clarity as when 
being in transit between actual places,
as when I hold my oldest dog 
who (I am afraid) I might not see again.
As when I allow myself to be fragile 

to a woman's love. As when I sit, seemingly 
alone in this private clearing in the woods 
in quiet company with a fellow soul.

this morning

Is it the certainty 
of loss that keeps us
going? That certain
kind of lack

kind of incompleteness
completes us. 

For what is "fullness"
and "perfection" 
in utter satisfaction?
But unsatisfactory.

Our lives are completed
by a sense of incomplete.
Perfection 
because imperfect. 

Else, a life dormant.
A life inert. 

So continuously we sing
memories of wounds.
Old old scars 
never heals. 

Or we pause on moments
perfect like this:
early morning sun 
through curtains to 
the floor, dog beside, 
detection book on lap, 
earl grey tea like new 
beginning, local bread 
and feta, some birds. 
A love letter
written to be given
sometime in the future.

Which will be 
not very long from now. 
As I anticipate 
the news anytime, 
sending me to another
place away
from here. 

words do not die, one must remember the sunshine

Words do not die, one must remember the sunshine
what it was that used to feel 
the world is large enough for all the rooms 

of love. 
All the windows open, you kiss by the street
both twenty 

or something again. Words do not die, especially
unsaid what it was that used to feel
what was meant when she said 

to never call again. One must remember the sunshine.
Words do not die in another universe
someone has courage to dial the phone again.

the last and first days

It is 1:27 AM, January 2nd. The last thing I did
on the first day of the year was coax and bring
one of the dogs, the oldest, 
to the bedroom where not too long ago she had  
dared to break the rule by choosing to follow.
Sleep on the bedroom rug, by the bedroom sleepers.
And be the first sun to wake in the morning. 

I had arrived home late from a massage,
had forgotten to bring a sweater, was in midst
of threatening flu in midst of December 
night wind under stars, 
was on the last stretch of patience knowing 
the dogs still need their day-end walk.
Had ran out of patience when, expecting much,
let her go without leash and she took too long. 

Maybe she didn't need to go and I didn't listen.
Had been bullheaded about it. So
she refused--when I did--to climb the stairs 
to bed. She refused to follow when called.
Refused when, feeling sorry,I coaxed.
I returned to the living room and found her
at the foot of the couch. And calling her again

asked she follow. 
She did (resentfully?)
Staying several feet away from me

where now I sit, now neither angry nor sleepy
typing the first hours away.