Undoing Time

Your dark dissenting eyes

and fragile face as cold at times

as Grecian memory, unfold what lies

inside. I called you lover once…again,

and even dared call you a man.

In ten thousand syllables,

page on page exposed, I marked

the measures of my soul.

Do you keep them banded tightly

like the straining sinews of an aching

heart’s lament, trembling at their echo,

wishing they were never sent?

This is no Russian countryside

remembered, and I am not

your mother now. Yet from the start

you made my eyes her eyes, and fixed

her face (if even for an instant)

over mine. You hurled your hurt

which set like stone and walled me

out, and thought me past

the age of someone you could truly

love — as if you truly ever could.

Self-pity is a solitary space,

and building prisons is an inside job.

I Let My Hair Grow Silver

I let my hair grow silver

to frame the jewel inside,

though acquaintances’ reactions

were less than dignified.

Bronze curls contain a comfort

for impaired society,

while any silver glare reflects

our close mortality.

I let my hair grow silver

to face an age old fear

that superficial wrappings

are what we hold most dear.

I had the sickly notion

that one for whom I’d care

would dare to love me only

with pigment in my hair.

I let my hair grow silver

to find a peace within,

to practice what I ponder,

settle in my skin.

Some say I look older;

Than what? I want to ask.

I am the fifty that I am

regardless of the mask.

I let my hair grow silver

to end a dull routine,

and because I’m worth it —

bronze, blonde or in between.

It’s strange how men are dashing,

distinguished in their gray,

while we look ten years tarnished

to their certainty.

To live a grander beauty,

to birth a finer art,

to cultivate a symmetry

that shines a strand apart,

I let my hair grow silver

and fed a deeper root,

which tapped a vein of richness

for being who I choose.

Age Fright

She thinks because she’s fifty-eight

and Romeo’s gone west,

the cosmic theatre of the heart’s

closed up shop, torn down

its sun sets, the actors, even

Lears and Falstaffs, turning tail

for fresher (read that younger) fare.

This (she gets dramatic) is the winter

of my discontent, made glorious…

by absolutely nothing.

I tell her it isn’t so.

She feels air stir, slinks

low in her chair, swats

at me as if I were a fly.

So much for the voices of angels.

I try again. You get what you be,

I say, and all you’re being now

is foolish.

She straightens a bit, thinks —

maybe I’m being foolish, thinks —

no I’m not.

Think again, I say. Feel

for something better.

She reaches for a square of chocolate, bolts

from the chair.

Forget Juliet, she thinks. (She’s on it now.)

This cue’s for Beatrice, much nothing

to do something about. I can redesign

the play, recast his part.

I tell her Benedick (she may want

to rethink that one) is searching,

on a slide of light, a twist of time, waiting.

She thinks—  I better get my act together.

Pacing, she rounds a mental corner,

fluffs her hair, practices her repartée.

I stretch my wings, do a little angel dance.

All the world is…after all, she says,

and makes a mental note to post

a new marquee.

They call me

unrealistic to deny

a dying world.

I see proliferation

where most see lack.

                     While most

are deafened

by despair, I soar free

in ways no outside

force can touch; hear

the ring of possibility.

They call me unconcerned.

I don’t read news,

don’t watch TV at all.

How does one

get sick enough

to heal another’s pain?

How would feeling anguish

bring a sister soul

relief? How much fight

can ever render peace?

They call me foolish.

I tell them —

hating

hate creates.

Push against a thing

and more is made —

a cosmic irony.

Only loving lets love grow.

They call me selfish.

For on this supposèd

woeful night

I dare to dance.

What other way

to be a light?

What if

when you die, you don’t,

and in an instant you can think yourself

an Einstein mind, a Shakespeare

soul, the body of a Marilyn Monroe.

What if moods make landscapes —

melancholy turning

misty plumes of gray, laughter

growing aster fields.

What if you don’t have to eat,

but can — yet never gain an ounce;

don’t have to sleep, but can,

dreams rooting in the world

as poetry, a lover’s smile.

What if everyone who ever

wronged your heart is there to hear

you voice the wrath of centuries…

and you no longer care.

And what if the only judgment made

of life, and solely by yourself is:

How well did I love?

Phoenix

Death swirls

moondust thick

suffocating

those who still require breath,

the dream crumbling

under whose god

is holier, whose god seeks

the just revenge,

and I think —

what use are words?

What use barely lyric

verse, tired tales of love

gone wrong, lines

designed for laughs?

What now is left

to inspire anything

but grief?

Chanted senseless, offered up

to gods who do not hear,

my words have died

six thousand deaths.

For weeks I leave them strewn

across a screen, across

a page, flat and lifeless

as the New York sky.

But soon,

a small familiar voice: write

it says. Be heart

in a time of mind gone mad;

resurrect

what’s beautiful and true.

If just one soul finds

tether to a saner

star, you’ve done well.

This is the job of art, to rise

from fire and ash,

impassioned, immortal,

alive with possibility.   

A Matter Of Timing

This autumn afternoon,

on the summer mountain where

I meet with cherished

friends to write, unfamiliar

faces occupy oakwood rockers,

flagstone terrace where we greet

the moon. October air is still

as sculpture, as if the slightest

stir might shimmer time, bare

our hovering spirits.

Easels stand like alien towers;

swirling brushes spatter

alizarin, burnt sienna, cobalt blue,

for me muted and unsubstantial

as the ones I miss.

It’s their mountain now,

these painted strangers,

just as in my lowland world,

this is the surreal time

of those who shake their fists

and speak in warring tongues.

Yet, beneath,

something summer lovely rests;

something which has never left;

something waiting  waiting

for its day.

Magnestic Muse #1

in a diamond moment

beneath

the twisted shadow

of a life unsung

a whispered symphonys

recalled

play it easy

like a summer wind

upon the lazy

fiddle of a day

Magnetic Muse #2

when winter shakes

its smooth white skin

and purple fingers

delirious with light

lick the peach of spring

time

in gorgeous dress

leaves me panting

trips my tongue

rocks my soaring

breast as I lie sweetly

cloaked in green

Magnetic Muse #4

from essential places

death watches true

and chants discordant

as the waxy rose

of worships crushing love

he stares

like shadowed sleep

at she who moans

all bare and delicate

an after pictured lover

aching some

but mostly gone