Sunday, November 30, 2014

two birds


wind scours
the hospital grounds . . .
a sparrow 
tumbles sideways 
in the empty air


~GUSTS 20, Fall/Winter 2014



I walk alone
with the wind at my back—
one swallow
slicing  through dark clouds
with the edge of its life


~Ribbons 10:3, Fall 2014

Friday, November 21, 2014

The Passage



                  going west
                  along the river—
                  water sweeps
                  around a stone cairn
                  shaped like a woman

                 on the riverbank,
                 a gate without a fence—
                 two windows 
                 frame the flow
                 of my journey to the sea

                 stumbling
                 onto a sand bar 
                 drenched in starlight
                 will I see your face
                 or will our eyes be one


                         ~Ribbons 10:3, Fall 2014



Saturday, November 15, 2014

one thread

the exile
in her prison cell
scratching poems
on a bar of soap . . . 
bubbles rise to the moon

~A Hundred Gourds 3:4, Sept. 2014

(for Irina Ratushinskaya, Russian poet & dissident) 



scribbling 
faint words to address 
the infinite —
I pluck  one thread 
in the harp of stars

~Skylark 2:2, winter 2014

Saturday, November 8, 2014

hawks

one by one
red-shouldered hawks
slip into the blue 
beyond the hills. . . 
this fire in my hearth


~Skylark 2:1, summer 2014



seizing 
six minutes alone
I soar
with a red-tailed hawk
four hundred heartbeats high

~Skylark 2:2, winter 2014


Sunday, November 2, 2014

All Souls



change your clocks
change your batteries—
how much longer
until I fall back
into that good night

~A Hundred Gourds 3:2, March 2014



All Souls’ Day—
against scudding clouds
a raven
rides the wind
from another world

~GUSTS 19: spring/summer 2014



the last few seeds 
on the dandelion clock
letting go
I set my watch 
to the next season

~Atlas Poetica 15, July 2013