Category Archives: Poems 2011

So much depends
on soil –

tire, wheel and
rain,

the position
of stars

and that distance
of time

between gravity
and grace.

Almost invisible, these gods
are not immortal, not
the all-powerful deities

displayed for symbols
and slogans – some haven’t even
a name to trade your mind

and heart for, like in heaven,
where pouting angels
look down with envy

upon their pagan games.
These gods slip upon you
around a flame, surround

like darkness, touch your
shoulder, or cover the flesh
in a dry rain of oak leaves –

they breathe the memories
of all that’s gone before –
living secretly among us.

…the barn light interrupts the dark
with hope – cars and sound, dead asleep
for miles, while old children parcel

a carcass in their dreams, each
playing on the edge of their grave
for a chance to win, another roll

on the same thin blanket spread
upon her flesh for generations –
drawing lines while she still breathes,

for yet another surgery. Here, we
hold her hand and pray once more
for the gods we’ve come to know.

Don’t say too much – trust
instead from whence you come
to sing its own song, and listen
closely for what can’t be said

with words, for the timid
peering through the brush –
for the Canyon Wren’s call
falling eerily within us.

You are the native, be
generous, leave something
on the doorstep to keep
guns inside the house.

Don’t say too much – they
have bastardized the words,
weaned them early, turned
them out without a home.