As Good

Shivering in the night
and in the fog of sleep, trying to find you,
And in my dreams make love to the warmth of you
beneath too-thin covers.

When the morning sun throws our bedframe pattern on the
wall,
Slowly, slowly descending as your blond and peaceful
Head
Dozes on my
Shoulder,
I know this chill has passed.

Soon I will put on my boots.
We will walk the stony upward path
To the dead hermit's abandoned house, and
say a prayer to his
God
and ours.
Then we'll visit Betty's sisters -- they
will bring us eggs and coffee.
It will be as good
As the morning sun that throws our bedframe pattern on the
wall.

El Paso, 2004.04.12

Taken

The moon is almost full, I say.
She's about to say, No, just past full
When we turn down the last alley to home:
the darkest stretch
A furtive wispy motion, the shape of a sneer
Halts us dead or alive
The wild maw of someone else's escaped fantasy
Is ready to swallow us
In our own backyard alley.
It is seriously tempting, this lure to be
     taken in, taken to where
     there are no more arguments
     about the moon
     taken beyond this dangling dull familiarity
     simply taken.
And though she feels it too,
Our hands find each other.

El Paso, 2004.04.10

A Bird in Boots

To carry such prodigious footwear
Her wings are very strong.
She is ready, just in case
Soaring ends and landing's hard.

Born of and borne by air,
The rain plays on her feathers happily as sunshine.
Through blue skies, grey clouds, and before rainbows,
she flies
As though she might be hiking the next moment,
if wings fail, or if she chooses.

Minneapolis, 2000 Fall

Wedding Poem

Our Whole Lives

I.
We said we would
Call the OWL:
March down the I'll,
Ring the bell and each other's
Fingers,
Vow ourselves into oblivion, wholeness, etc.
And die.

II.
The OWL has special wing feathers that quiet its flight,
So the prey never detects the predator.
One noiseless flap, two, and the small mammal is caught.
As out of the soul’s dark night, love is suddenly there, upon us:
Talons and beak.
We succumb,
And turn our bodies over to the nourishment of a grander thing.

2000 May, 2009 Apr