Categories
Poems

OctPoWriMo 23

Trying to make space
for all the gigabytes
on their way
to a new device

I started deleting
media I thought were only
cached in an instance
but lived in the cloud

turns out they weren’t
and for a brief moment
they were irreplaceable
until I remembered to open

another folder where my past
self already saved them
Categories
Poems

OctPoWriMo 16

Everything my daughter 
needs to know
about the father
I would like to be

might be summarized
in the verse or two
of the hymn I could not sing
with her in my arms

stunned into teary silence
not by the words
but at the melody
included in the service

the day her parents found
hope in each other’s dreams
Categories
Poems

AugPoWriMo 31

Not sure if we’ve broken past the breaking 
point of no return random papers strewn
on gaudy carpet not declassified
except by an edict after the fact
no one recognized the face of time framed
for boxes to coexist within made
impermanent the glimmer of hope felt
polls too temporary to be trusted
in this rust belt cafe the crudité
was never really on the menu though
that’s before you consider the tequila
why not take less of what they are drinking
fascists qualified by prefix semi
could a new era happen already?
Categories
Poems

AugPoWriMo 18

That feeling when you realize
the music that formed you
in your formative years was
nearly some forty years ago now
thanks to hours of some songs
played on a radio not in your town
but in your former hometown
which formed you and you haven’t found
a fitting replacement you make sure
your phone is still streaming said
music as you walk in the door and dance
with your almost four month old
hold me now in your eyes hands and feet
the light the heat I am complete
Categories
Poems

AugPoWriMo 10

To think that these pictures
capture the same creature
sleeping in the other room

at a recent previously
appointed point in time
aging apparently at the same rate

as these tired maybe middle aged
faces growing younger all the time
a match for that slight inflection

the world not quite as it was
when you arrived even better
now we know how much improved

it will be having you in it
evidence our souls met your spirit
Categories
Poems

JulyPoWriMo 16

How much easier
to remember
your preverbal
existence

how else recognize
that cooing from
sights and sounds
familiar unknown

best respond with
your own
who knows how
to react instinct

if not built in then
part of the line
Categories
Poems

JulyPoWriMo 13

I subscribe
to the scientific belief
that the instrument
beaming back images
with newly discovered
billion year old clarity
are only reflecting
the conditions
that made it possible
for me to take a snap
to capture the cat
stretching goodnight
at your general direction
in the bassinet
Categories
Poems

AprilPoWriMo 24

Running out of time 
before getting to know you
not sure what to do

build some furniture
maybe while wondering who
you will be with us

how eager you are
to take a first breath out here
and make us breathless

questioning no doubt
who we thought we were without
your breathing with us

turning inside out
what we thought we were about
Categories
Poems

AprilPoWriMo 23

Everybody seems to be rushing back
to bad habits that made society
so unlivable for so very long
applaud proliferation of spittle
in tightest quarters imaginable
even those who would overthrow the state
have a chance to win it all in midterms
what makes us incapable of taking
the evidence before us and making
reasonable decisions like shaking
a plague to its knees by keeping distance
it wasn’t so unpleasant to fabric
our faces screaming inside of our hearts
togetherness keeps us a world apart
Categories
Poems

AprilPoWriMo 22

There might be time to know where the time goes
likely it will not be in this lifetime
too many minutes to accumulate
preceded by hours decades months days years
seconds are the only response to sweets
worth taking into account or measure
abundance of molecules on the way
to their dissolution insoluble
energy neither created destroyed
by looking what might be the other way
universe ever expands to a point
in the distant past shared distinct by all
a spark the only light a burning flame
continues to kindle forgets its name