The Birth of the Cold

I don’t care what my calendar says

Winter started today

Winter is the most obnoxious season

no other season makes such a rude entrance.

Spring melts Winter

then Summer scorches Spring

till Autumn falls Summer

then Fall falls to Winter

each season is stronger than its predecessor

then weaker than its successor

while tonight Winter waits for no calendar

sure December 21 6:03 pm might be set in print

and circled

as Old Man Winter’s due date

but tonight Mother Nature has other plans

and while the calendar may read November

this snow storm

is Old Man Winter crashing Autumn’s party

as fallen leaves are buried

beneath this first snowfall.

Time Clocked Me In The Face

This face of time looks more like Jackson Pollack’s Autumn

than Cezanne’s still-life of apples and pears

cause time is an abstract

and that picture of apples and pears

isn’t ever going to ripen or rotten

like some random splash of paint

can be defined in a billion different ways

can become a pattern

in the eyes

of the mad and the committed

of anything so furiously

that everything they see

looks just like it

like this poem

can never mean

what it means to me

what it means to you

so let’s drink to that.

Light So Light

Light so light

doesn’t even feel right in its own sight

or even know its existence

though it flows through secret tributaries

through words known and unknown

with words written and words unwritten

made up of the same stuff of broken stars

shattered into supernovas

universes and broken cookies

scattered across this milky way

lost till finding

itself tossed together as crumbs upon this very page

meaning far less than we’ll ever know

for a poem can never know itself

softer than this ink upon this page

as fragile as this Tao Itself

its pieces became an atlas and other works of fiction

became Bibles for travelers who lived and died by their TV guide

dying in their living room

while the Bible was written in ancient Greek

is all Greek to everybody

except the ancient Greeks

who never believed in it

in the first place.

 

This Close To That

My fingers set me moving to lead me here

and two lines in and I’m still not sure where here is

yet I keep typing

I could check a dictionary to find the right word

I could check an atlas to remind me

here I am

I could check my philosophy textbook

to tell me

I think therefore I am

or I could check my side-view mirror

to see that objects in the mirror are closer than they appear

cause right now I only exist in your eyes

so you tell me

how we got here

and I’d be eternally grateful

if we could kiss

and outlast

the next

and final

line.

I Can See Dead Celestial Bodies Naked

Stars are like ghosts

who don’t even know

they’re dead

as they shine through the night

haunting the sleeping with light

by pretending still to be alive

needing to illuminate

these dying embers

with a flicker of the eyes

an exhale of hot wind

resurrects original sin

even before the first bite

that spark

that sets them all

alight

are the words of dead poets who

will will the living

to make their peace with death

as their verses can kill curses

who can know

when the moon can eclipse the sun

or a streetlight can outglow

even a UFO.

 

Dice With The Universe

Go back and read this sentence again

did it read the same both times?

Wait till we get to the end

then read it all again

then tell me how much these words

have changed and grown

faster than any wisdom you have ever known

except for not touching hot elements

few bits of wisdom are as reflexive

as love

can go either way

like the reading of a blood test

can say how physically and deeply you loved

can be what kills you in the end

or like the reading of a urine test

can tell you you’re pregnant

ultimately

it’s all a crapshoot

you just get to set the odds

and then pee on the results.

Winter is the New Fall

The last autumn apple falls

off the apple tree

hitting decaying leaves that took the same leap

yesterday

leaves that left branches above

painted by November’s brush

bright yellows fade as a dying camp fire

to the red embers

of wood

now more ash than wood

we watch die

with one more marshmallow

the last rites of

the sun

till she returns

to sun us all

next Spring.