five kitchen poems

between the carrots

and the kohlrabi

I paint

my secret life blood-red

with the juice of beets       

scribbling

poems to eat 

on the grocery list

I let the toast

go up in smoke

the thwack

of a cherry pitter

missing half the pits

my desire in life

to do one thing well

new-laid eggs

bobbing in cool water . . .

gingerly

I rub the dross

from my poems

all morning

reading tanka—

my compost bin

heaped with pineapple,

strawberry, mango, rose

Atlas Poetica 13, Fall 2012

[dark-red roses]

gathering

dark-red roses

I trim the thorns                         

cutting off regrets

before a petal falls

tinywords 13:1, April 10, 2013

[poppies]

summer dusk

touching the poppies’

red silk throats . . .

what need have I

            of opium?

Notes from the Gean 14, Dec. 2012

[a taste of otherness]

the flicker

of the black snake’s tongue

at the toe of my shoe

a taste of otherness

among the iris

Atlas Poetica 13, Fall 2012

[the book of wildflowers. . . ]

the book

of wildflowers

my mother bound—

among the brittle leaves

these four-leaf clovers

 Gusts 17, spring/summer 2013

[darning needles]

drifting

toward sleep on the bank 

of the pond . . .

can sky-blue darning needles

mend my raveled dreams

Atlas Poetica 12, summer 2012

[wood thrush]

following

the wood thrush north

two thousand miles . . .

in his ultra-light pack,

            an accordion

Atlas Poetica 13, Fall 2012