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
14
Tag Archives: poems
One
One
I am Brahma
the straight line, the upright being,
fire that flares,
seed without end, manifold
self beyond all
polarity, radiating sun:
the all.
Philosophers considered one a non-number,
generatrix of all that follows.
Other.
The singularity. The lone.
From the Indo-European oi-qos we achieve solitude,
while the collective meaning of one derives from the Sanskrit sam.
United in itself, it changes nothing,
becoming everything.
On its side it represents the horizon.
Alone is all-one.
The Latin non is one negated, as is the German nein.
Symbol of intellect, the Hindu moon glows wide.
Atomic number of hydrogen, magician’s numeral,
monad and eccentric, I bear the empty product.
“One” last appeared here in April 2017.
A Cheese Omelet at Midnight
A Cheese Omelet at Midnight
You can’t ever leave without saying something,
no matter how insipid. That sweater looks good
on you. It’s supposed to rain tomorrow. I’m sorry
I burned the omelet. Nasdaq has plunged 3%
since last week. And I, in return, can’t let you go without
replying in equal measure. It matches your eyes. I love
to smell rain in August. That cheddar was delicious.
Maybe I’ll start a savings account. Next month.
So I wash dishes when you’re gone, wipe down the
counters, pour salt into the shaker, grab a book, join my
cat in bed. This tune’s been overplayed, the grooves’re
worn down. Maybe next time I’ll say what I mean,
tell you what I want: It would look better in a heap
on the floor. How about a shower here, tonight? Kiss
me and I’ll never think of it again. I don’t give a rat’s
ass about the stock exchange. Step away from that door!
I’ll make your lunch, butter your 7-grain toast, assemble
your IKEA furniture, balance your books, even dye
my hair pink, tattoo a pig on my thigh and drink light beer
in your honor, if you would agree to say what’s on your
mind. On second thought, don’t. Tell me, instead,
what I want to hear, but make it heart-felt. Truthful
and direct. Poached but earnest. Hard-boiled but tender.
I’ll cook your eggs. Invest in me. You’ll earn interest.
* * *
This originally appeared in August 2015, as the 25th offering in the Tupelo Press 30-30 fund raiser. Thank you, Pleasant Street, for sponsoring this.
Rice
Rice
Yesterday’s rain informs me I’m born of luck and blended
strands, of hope and words forged before a common tongue emerged.
Of my first two languages only one still breathes.
The other manifests in exile, in blurred images and hummed tunes.
Rice is my staple. I eat it without regarding its English etymology,
its transition from Sanskrit to Persian and Greek, to Latin, to French.
Flooding is not mandatory in cultivation, but requires less effort.
Rice contains arsenic, yet I crave its polished grains.
In my monolingual home we still call it gohan, literally cooked rice, or meal.
The kanji character, bei, also means America.
Representing a field, it symbolizes abundance, security, and fertility.
Three rice plants tied with a rope. Many. Life’s foundation.
To understand Japan, look to rice. To appreciate breadth, think gohan.
Humility exemplified: sake consists of rice, water and mold.
The words we shape predicate a communion of aesthetics.
Miscomprehension inhabits consequence.
* * *
“Rice” has appeared here twice before, and is included in my chapbook-length work, The Circumference of Other, published in Ides, a one-volume collection of fifteen chapbooks published by Silver Birch Press and available on Amazon.com.
Theology of Carrots
Theology of Carrots
We hide our best
underground
plumed by ornamental
headpieces
allowing the wisdom
of taproots
to prosper
in darkness.
“Theology of Carrots” first appeared here in September 2017.
The Geography of Silence
The Geography of Silence
1. Laundry drooping at midday.
2. She dreams off-key, in pastels.
3. With misunderstanding comes anger.
4. Mata! Mata! Again!
5. Ashes crossing the ocean.
6. Sweat, and the taste of separation.
7. Reaching for past moons, she cries.
8. Death’s shade.
9. Rice.
10. Self-sacrifice, the centered gift.
11. Inward, always. Inward.
“The Geography of Silence” last appeared here in April 2017.
No One Knows
No One Knows
There, the dream of flying
cars, and the next,
tumbling through soft
glass, inconsiderate and
hopeful as a child
on his birthday,
hands outstretched, waiting.
Unsmiling. You might ask
where this story turns,
whether the glass reconstitutes
or the car crashes,
reminders of a childhood
reconsidered and the simplest
truth, which is no one knows.
“No One Knows” was first published in The Pangolin Review in March 2018.
Riddle, Dollar, String
Riddle, Dollar, String
Living between, she pretends the comfort of walls
within walls, the unseen’s dispensation.
A slow dragging. The raked leaves.
And all the naked oaks bowing to the wind,
feeling the scratch of impending growth,
the twig’s pearl poised to push through
this mask, stolen sounds dotting the morning.
Later, watching lizards on the wall
or the haze of bees surrounding the agave.
No one pays. Limestone. Mulch. Light.
Unformed thoughts snaking through.
Like that line wrapped around her waist,
another purpose only she could explain.
“Riddle, Dollar, String” first appeared in The New Reader Magazine, in March 2018.
What Feet Know (with recording)
What Feet Know
The earth and its subterfuge.
Gravity and the points between here and there.
And sometimes the rasp of grainy mud
clenched between toes,
or a rock under the arch,
an explanation too pointed
for display on a page,
too hard, too much for flesh to bear.
No constellations foment underground.
Nothing there orbits a companion.
No light but for that darkness the heel scrapes away.
“What Feet Know” was featured on Postcard Poems and Prose Magazine in December 2016, and is included in my chapbook, From Every Moment a Second, available Available at Amazon.Com and Here.
The Neurotic Dreams September in April
The Neurotic Dreams September in April
Already I have become the beginning of a partial ghost, sleeping the summer
sleep in winter, choosing night over breakfast and the ritual of dousing lights.
This much I know: the moon returns each month, and tonight you lie awake
in a bed across the river, in a house with sixteen windows and a cold oven,
where your true name hides under the floorboard behind the pantry door.
*
Differences season our days — from flowers to snow, root to nectar — take
one and the other lessens in its own sight. One day I’ll overcome this longing
for things and will be complete in what I own, living my life beyond the page,
past the white space and dead letters. When I mention hearts, I mean that
muscle lodged in my chest. Genetics, not romance. Tissue. Arteries, veins.
*
Dark cars on the street. Cattle grazing in the damp pasture. The liquor store
sign glaring “CLOSED.” Separate yet included, we observed these scenes but
assigned them to the periphery, grounded in our own closed frames. In a
different time I would transcend my nature and strive to withstand yours.
Look. That star, the fog silhouetting the tombstones. A bobbing light.
*
Love is a gray morning, a steel-toed shoe or coating of black ice; nothing you
do will repeal its treachery. There, on my stone porch, I will inhale the smoke
of a thousand burned photographs. The sun will descend but you won’t share
it, and I’ll no longer hum your tune. When I rise no one sees. Or everyone
stares. Imagine that great cow of a moon lowing through the night.
“The Neurotic Dreams September in April” was published in deLuge in December 2016, and was written during the August 2015 Tupelo Press 30-30 challenge. Many thanks to artist extraordinaire Ron Throop for sponsoring and providing the title.
