Prayers, Portraits, Post-Its (13)

Almost

about 19
a Joan Jett type

slouched smoking
with 2 friends

with black rose
tattoos

from ankles
all the way up

under her
miniskirt (this

is March)
I slow down

involuntarily—
needle...night...flower

hear the word
“washable”

and speed right
up again.

The Door*

the future then

standing on that road
outside Blaubeuren
even the dust
shines and is white

staring with eyes
newly-concentrated
at the wheatfield becoming

more than wheat, or
for the first time, wheat

a vibratory world
of timeless power, humming
molecular dynamo
and awesome geometry

razor-sharp planes

electric blue &
liquid gold

if i could see
then, the battering years
ahead:

shocked, drugged, poor
in all ways; or
just that one terrible
moment when i smashed
my head repeatedly
on the linoleum floor
to free it—

would i still stare
through this shimmering door

feeling myself enter?

[*“The Door” was the final poem in my self-published collection Black and White Pictures After a Rainstorm, 1988.]

Prayers, Portraits, Post-Its (12)

“We will pray for you”

It is the hush of the voice, that mindful
dip, matching the psalm of the fan while you made
your confession, its soft measured slap
keeping your raw noise to lawful shape,
that, more than the five bare words, shocks you awake–
Look up:
mercy should shatter no less than sin:
take in with battered gaze this calm pale face,
its straight brown hair, brown eyes, firm delicate chin–
All about you rears this giant breathing
space, exhaling like an animal,
the poise and bend of its far bricks and wood
return you to all those way stations
you entered and filled. You were their heart:
beating with every second to arrive and depart.

Prayers, Portraits, Post-Its (11)

Small Orange Meal

2 raw carrots, washed & scraped
1 navel orange
a bowl of almonds & dried apricots
3 shots tequila

Prayers, Portraits, Post-Its (10)

“I have gained a strange disease”

On lilac-coloured paper
that has dried and tears crisply–
who were you that wrote these lines?

Where do you make your home now, and with whom?

Prayers, Portraits, Post-Its (9)

Lines in March

Clear signs that point beyond signs,
A broom that sweeps itself up last.

Prayers, Portraits, Post-Its (8)

Check, Please

Pleasures today have been trim and complete.
A robin's black back in binocular discs,
a packet of work and a bill–neither big.
Almonds, green grapes, the last two croissants;
a girl in tight jeans getting sleek in the rain.
A voice in the phone: “Are we still on for eight?”