Moths
Small moths stir
in the darkness.
I feel their
wings brush my
face, my hands,
remembering the cry
of something unseen.
It is windy
again this morning.
* * *
“Moths” first appeared here in July 2015.
Moths
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Tag Archives: life
Forgotten
Forgotten
Is it simply forgotten
or not remembered?
My father coughs
through his days,
asking for answers
only his brother knows.
Some books are better
read from the end,
he says. I don’t know
what to do.
He tries to spell his name
but the letters elude him,
teetering between symbol
and thought and choice.
The chair tips over
when I lean too far back,
replacing memories
with hardwood
and a new bruise
coloring my thoughts.
This word, that one.
A face, the date.
Last Tuesday’s crumb.
The floor accepts us all.
* * *
“Forgotten” first appeared in ISACOUSTIC* in January 2018.
Palinode (birds)
Palinode (birds)
Simplicity, as in the cloaca. One aperture for all: eggs,
urine, sperm, feces. The majority of birds copulate
by joining the openings of their cloacae (most male
birds lack penises). Nothing is for nothing.
Nothing is for nothing, but the ache of emptiness
bestows its own reward. That movement from outer
world to inner, to anima, to breath, to flight,
approaching heaven. Birds know the way.
Knowing the way, birds express our envy of the
boundless, testament to the unity of earth and sky,
instinct’s voice. We see feathers not as epidermal
outgrowths, but as emblems of what we forever seek.
As emblems of what we seek, crows exploit man’s
folly, exposing hidden truths. Thought and memory
recede, leaving us foundered. Altered consciousness,
flight, the space to believe, simplicity’s forms in one.
“Palinode (birds)” first appeared in slightly different form in Otoliths in fall 2016.
Two Poems Up at Taos Journal of International Poetry & Art
My poems “Letter to Geis from This Side of the Glass” and “A Texas Goodbye” are live at the Taos Journal of International Poetry & Art. D.G. Geis was a friend, a larger than life poet, and a fellow Texan. We were both finalists for the Slippery Elm poetry prize in 2017, and after learning that we didn’t win, decided to have a “losers’ lunch” in Bandera, Texas, the closest town to our respective rural properties. Much laughter ensued, and we made plans to get together for a beer in the coming months. Alas, that was not to be.
While Trespassing I Note the Sadness of Old Fences
While Trespassing I Note the Sadness of Old Fences
I write poems when I can,
in late morning or during
the afternoon, between chores
but before dinner. And sometimes
I duck through spaces
void of wire barbs, and consider
how to fill the incomplete, which words,
what materials could repair
those particular holes. I cut my own
fence once, to access our house
when the creek flooded the road,
lugging uphill through the snake
grass a jug of scotch, my mandolin
and a watermelon, essentials for a weekend’s
respite. To be truthful I cut only the lowest
strand, to help the dog get through — I
was able to climb over, but he couldn’t dig
through the limestone rubble to wriggle
under, and we’d come too far
to simply turn around.
* * *
This appeared in riverSedge, Volume 29, Issue 1, released in October 2016. I first encountered riverSedge in 1983, and vowed that one day my poetry would be published in this journal. It took a while…
Mirror
Mirror
The attraction is not
unexpected. We see
what is placed
before us, not
what may be.
The mirror is empty
until approached.
* * *
One of six short poems included in my micro-chapbook, You Break What Falls. Available for free download here: http://www.origamipoems.com/poets/236-robert-okaji
“Mirror” first appeared here in May 2015.
The Politics of Doors
The Politics of Doors
With every doorway, decisions.
Accept, deny. Turn.
How to resist the ajar,
the barely closed?
Is what emerges
expelled or escaped,
free or released?
Resistant as always,
I swivel,
pause to inhale.
Every Wind (with recording)
Every Wind
Every wind loses itself,
no matter where
it starts. I want
a little piece of you.
No.
I want your atmosphere
bundled in a small rice paper packet
and labeled with strings of new rain
and stepping stones.
I want
the grace of silence
blowing in through the cracked
window, disturbing only
the shadows.
Everywhere I go, bits of me linger,
searching for you.
Grief ages one thread at a time,
lurking like an odor
among the lost
things,
or your breath,
still out there,
drifting.
* * *
Music: “Gymnopedie No. 1” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
“Every Wind” first appeared in The Lake in July 2016, and is included in my chapbook, From Every Moment a Second, available for order via Amazon.com and Finishing Line Press.
Well Pump
Well Pump
To be within, yet without: the rootless seed.
Staring through glass, we see only the surface
sliced thin like cell-thick specimen slides.
I dream of knowing, of inclusion.
The well pump is fried, but only thieves
return our calls. How to deflect the lure
of complicity? Stack stone, observe clouds.
Tap the cistern. Absorb its hollow tune.
* * *
“Well Pump” first appeared in January 2018 in Amethyst Review.
Many thanks to editor Sarah Law for accepting it.
Inscrutable
Inscrutable
The river fills her body
like handwriting on a scrap
folded into a book
and found years later.
No one reads that language.
Undiscovered,
she remains closed, cleansed,
awaiting interpretation.
* * *
“Inscrutable” was first published in Volume 3, Issue 1 of Ink in Thirds. Thank you, Grace Black, for taking this piece!
O at the Edges 