New Poems

Disinfected

Broomhead, bleach. A sound
scrubbing. Hours. A permanent
speak of cleaning. They save
us, or so we think. They
save us, savage us. The tisk
tasking a life. Broom
handle, dustpan. A clown
scrubbing. Teacups. A wax
waning. The spotlessness
of gleam. They salvage us,
or so we think. They
savage us, they scour us.
The dream. A room
where no living does.
A broom in the corner.
A loon on the floor.
They save us, or so we think.


My Son's First Word

It was as if his voice searched the world
over for a word, the smallest word
conceived, and when he found it,
his voice pressed it between his thumb
and finger to make it smaller
still, so small it became a tiny
pebble he tossed in the shoreline
of his mouth. He is tasting
his first word's salt, its lightness
and strum. He is hearing
the first word shape into shelves
of continents, a word never
uttered the world over. It
is his. It is mine. It
is the first day and night
dawning on his tongue, the world's
blue luminosity humming
its first chord of creation,
a world just now set in fierce
motion. It is ours. It is ours.


Summer Speaks

Summer says, go make of me
a walrus head or circumnavigate
a set of sheets. Lock out the lazy.
Do with me what you would an elephant
hide. Dance with me. Snap
peas. The little girl in diapers,
let her press her bare feet
into the crawling thyme. Memorize
me, my late darkness. Do
with me a dance to plunder
the winter tune, the damp
collic, the dream cloven,
too deep for human hands.
Summer lies back, counting
her fingers over and over. She
waits for us to get tired
of her glory, her sun-stripped
madness among the pines.


McPoem in the Poetry Workshop

What did you mean by "evening's
hair"? Was it the wind blowing
across her face? And what is
it to bear the wind? It is nothing.
It's kind of nice, actually. And
what might the unreasonable
songs of angels sound like?
The song should sound like glass.
No, it isn't bad at all. This
is a woman on the back porch
smoking on the sly, right? Yes,
it could be worse. Just listen
to the news. And all of her
thinking about erstwhile
and peter pan collars makes me
hate her a little, because it
means she can't see herself
for who she really is. The line
with "headlong against
the broken cedar" could be
something, if it wasn't for that
damn moon showing up again,
or the nonsense about her
being "flutter tuned, scrim
scarlet, dolce dozen love."
Or when you tossed the whole
thing out in the last line,
the tragic little epigram
about a child loving this way, too.
A sad little child, generalized,
denied everything except being
the punchline of a sad little poem.