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Archive for February, 2018

The Legacy of Gustav Klimt and His Enduring Kiss

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on February 28, 2018| 2 Comments »

After over a hundred years,

the blue flowers in her hair

are still as blue and the ivy

in his hair is still as green

and her face is just as soft

and serene as when she received

the kiss, the kiss that made

the whole world fall in love

with Gustav Klimt. And who

wouldn’t want to be caught

forever and ever in a golden

embrace, infinitely tender,

eternally erotic, the way

no kiss truly is? But here

they are, defying the fall,

these lovers, hanging unframed

on the wall of the Belvedere,

still passionate, lust-drowsy,

their love spilling into the halls

as the whole world around

them dissolves into shimmer,

into shine.

http://www.cnn.com/style/article/gustav-klimt-100-years/?iid=ob_lockedrail_bottomlarge

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One for My Dad

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on February 27, 2018| 8 Comments »

 

 

 

so tender his tears

that thirty years later

I find them in my own eyes

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While Trying to Decide What Comes Next

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , on February 26, 2018| 2 Comments »

 

 

 

There is clarity in the three-hole punch,

the way it is made to receive the paper,

always the same every time.

 

How it punches the holes always

equidistant from each other. It never worries

it’s not doing its job good enough. Never

 

worries it isn’t worthy of the pages it meets.

There is clarity in the way it flexes beneath

the hand, how it does the one thing it was made

 

to do. And you, with your hand on the black

length of it, you with your thousands of choices

inside every moment, what is it that needs

 

your precision? Maybe you’re making it

too hard. Maybe it’s your turn to do

the one thing you were made to do.

 

 

 

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Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , on February 25, 2018| 2 Comments »

The wind has its way

with you. Sun, too.

Raveling. Fading. And

still you fly, sincere,

half mast.

 

Ode to the American Flag

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One Afternoon Hike

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on February 24, 2018| 1 Comment »

 

—for Rachel

 

 

between the cactus,

we walk, our conversation

daring to step wherever it wants

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When I Thought I Wanted Things to be Different

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , on February 23, 2018| 4 Comments »

 

 

 

Sometimes, she said, being uncomfortable

is what we need to do.

 

And I think of the scald of hot water,

how it cleans the stain.

 

How being covered in abrasive fuzz

is the only way to harvest the peach.

 

How the seed is carried by the burr.

It is human to seek pleasure, shun pain.

 

But think of the tree, how it lets

the gale rip away what is dead.

 

And the grape, how it bubbles

and foams before it becomes wine.

 

And the cactus, how it needs the drought

as much as it needs the rain.

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Should We Tell Her?

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on February 22, 2018| 2 Comments »

 

 

 

Somewhere in my heart

there is a tiny woman

with a crimson scarf

and hair pulled back

who is balancing

on a tightrope—

she has not yet learned

that it is okay

for her to fall,

that the net

will always catch her,

so she keeps doing

the same boring walk

back and forth

thinking how brave

and how proficient

she is at staying

on the rope,

never learning

she could also

jump and swing

and leap and twirl and fall

and get back up.

 

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After Scouring the Mountaintop

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on February 21, 2018| Leave a Comment »

 

 

 

Looking for god under the bed—

finding dust bunnies.

Sacred dust bunnies.

Of course, I think,

but to be honest, friend,

I don’t really see

the divine

in these drifts of abandoned hair

and fuzz and grit,

no matter how much I’d like to.

Now I know how I get in my own way.

For here on, I’ll need to question

my eyes more often.

Lower my standards? Perhaps

feel myself being held

up to the light

to see what shines.

 

 

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Easier with a Friend

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on February 19, 2018| 4 Comments »

 

for Corinne, skate skier extraordinaire

 

 

The meadow was a violent scourge of white,

and still we chose to leave our cars and ski.

The wind and blowing snow obscured our sight,

 

lashed through our hats and stole our breath, but we

leaned into it and laughed, as if the storm

were nothing more than an excuse to be

 

more brave, more willing to eschew what’s warm

so we might face our fear, find joy in risk—

and sure enough, I felt myself transform

 

from nervousness to animated bliss—

and we for hours skied amidst the gusts

and for that time, knew nothing more than this:

 

to meet the crazy storm. When scared, to thrust

ourselves into the howling world. And trust.

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Thinking Those Three Hoodlums Could Use a Good Dose of Nevermore

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on February 19, 2018| Leave a Comment »

 

 

 

Those boys who jumped you at the dance—

I want the chance

to find them now

and ask them how

they feel about themselves as men.

But then again,

perhaps it would

feel twice as good

to sit them in a row and read

them poems, see

them squirm to Poe—

then let them go.

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Requiem

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on February 18, 2018| 2 Comments »

 

for Wallace Hartley and the musicians of the Titanic

 

 

And as the splendid ship began to list

and as the people scrambled on the decks,

the band struck up a ragtime tune, and next

they played an autumn waltz. Yes there, amidst

the screaming and the shouts, the band persisted,

giving to the night what they gave best—

the peace that comes from melody. They blessed

the crowd with song till waves consumed the ship.

 

How is it that they all agreed to stay?

Some artist’s creed? Some sense this was their gift?

Survivors say they heard the soaring staves

of hymns escort them as they rowed away—

still heard them as the aft began to lift.

And sink. Then nothing but Atlantic waves.

 

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Dreaming Out of Season

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on February 17, 2018| 3 Comments »

 

 

 

Say it’s a hundred pumpkins

and you need to get them all

into the car, but the car

cannot hold all the pumpkins.

A mathematician might tell you no,

it can’t be done, citing volume

and the properties of matter. And a fixer

might tell you how to tie the pumpkins

to the roof of the car. A Buddhist

might suggest you let them go.

But any lover will tell you

that pumpkins make good carriages

and that with that many pumpkins,

there’s bound to be a pair of glass

slippers around here somewhere.

And, hiding amidst the seeds

and the strings, at least a little

happily ever after.

 

 

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Love Lessons

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , on February 16, 2018| 6 Comments »

 

 

When the favorite sweater

becomes threadbare at the wrists

and already you’ve mended it

repeatedly: when you find yourself sewing

on top of your sewing and there

is little left of original thread,

is this when you decide

that the sweater is better worn

with holes, that not everything

needs fixing, that sometimes

what is most loved is what

is most beyond repair?

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One Prayer

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on February 15, 2018| 1 Comment »

 

 

 

with no snow

to make snow angels

I flap my arms

make night angels

send them to you

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Presence

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on February 15, 2018| Leave a Comment »

 

 

When the cat ran away,

I noticed how she did not move

between the legs of the chairs,

how she did not yowl by her bowl

nor sit in the window. Everything

I saw was where she was not.

All day, I held it close,

her absence. All day,

I thought how she was not here.

Was it true?

 

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And Again

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on February 13, 2018| 3 Comments »

 

 

 

And what if I never get it right,

this loving, this giving of the self

to the other? And what if I die

before learning how to offer

my everything? What if, though

I say I want this generous,

indefatigable love, what if

I forever find a way to hold

some corner back? I don’t want

to find out the answer

to that. I want to be the sun

that gives and gives until it burns out,

the sea that kisses the shore

and only moves away so that

it might rush up to kiss it again.

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Three Poems for Valentine’s Day

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , on February 12, 2018| Leave a Comment »

Happy Day of Love!

Three love poems from this year are published today in Telluride Inside and Out–share them with your loved ones!

Three Love Poems

 

 

 

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What Took Me So Long

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on February 12, 2018| Leave a Comment »

 

 

playing referee

between the sun and clouds,

eventually I take off my stripes

to be a spectator instead—

how pleasant

without all that whistling

 

 

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One Inescapable

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , on February 11, 2018| 2 Comments »

 

 

 

Ducking into the woods

it is harder to tell

the storm has come—

though here

beneath the trees

in my own chest,

thunder.

 

 

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That Winter Evening

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , on February 10, 2018| Leave a Comment »

 

for Billy Miller, remembering events on January 4, 2012

 

 

When the man pulled my father

from the icy waters of Lake Michigan,

he did not know years later my step-daughter

would need someone to buy her a sweater

so she would feel nurtured, did not know

that my son would need someone

to make a mosaic with him so that he

could feel loved, did not know

that my daughter would need

someone to tell her that she

was beautiful. When the man

pulled my father out of the water—

my dad had been fishing alone—

that off-duty fireman couldn’t have known

that years later this very daughter

would sit beside her father and hold his hand

and weep at the simple gift

of being able to hold his hand.

The fireman was doing what he knew to do—

to rush to the person in need of help.

He didn’t think then of the other lives

blessed by the man. Did not think

of the other lives he blessed with his hands

when he chose to try, though the odds

of saving the man were low.

He knew only to reach.

Years later, my mother still sleeps

beside the man that was pulled

from the winter lake.

Give us hands that know to reach

for each other—stranger, neighbor,

friend. Give us hands that unthinkingly

choose to save the family

we’ve never met.

 

See the news story here.

 

 

 

 

 

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